


Breaking Light

by Serriya (Keolah)



Series: Pandora's Dimensional Gateway [1]
Category: Greek and Roman Mythology, Norse Mythology, Vampire: The Masquerade
Genre: Action/Adventure, Alternate Universe - Science Fiction, Artificial Intelligence, Complete, Crossover, Dimension Travel, F/F, NaNoWriMo, No Canon Knowledge Required, Novel, Spaceships, Vampires, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-11-01
Updated: 2008-11-30
Packaged: 2017-11-13 13:30:30
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 27
Words: 96,998
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/504031
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Keolah/pseuds/Serriya
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Tasha Johnson, a Toreador vampire, crash-lands her way into another universe entirely. She and her companions become embroiled in plots within plots surrounding a galactic government run primarily by AIs, who hold many planets in sway by means of a Sapience Test, a sprawling corporation called Pandora, and a seedy underworld where anything goes.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Sudden Landing

The lights of the sensor tower flickered on and off against the starlit sky of the Midgard night. Jannika cursed silently under her breath as she tweaked with the machinery, but despite her best efforts, the tower refused to function properly. Stubborn things, anyway. This simply would not do. The Midgard sensor grid would be very effective if it weren't for the fact that half of the towers weren't working right.

As she hung from the tower, a light in the sky caught her attention, and she looked up. At first she thought it might be another meteor, but it was too bright and close for that, unless it was heading straight at her. Then she realized that whatever it was, _was_ heading almost straight for her, and as it grew closer she realized that it was a spaceship.

"Ack!" Jannika cried out, flinging herself off the tower as the spaceship came barreling into the ground near its base. Sparks flew, and the tower collapsed with a sickening crunch as she hit the ground with a grunt, quietly thankful that the sensor towers weren't particularly tall. At least she didn't think any of her bones were broken, but someone was going to be _pissed_ about the damage here.

Jannika slowly climbed to her feet again, still a bit stunned, brushing herself off and coughing at the dust kicked up by the landing. Squinting and rubbing her eyes, she tried to take a closer look at the wreckage, to see if there were any survivors, but it was quite dark with the lights on the tower having been put out again. She pulled out a hand-held light from her waist belt and shone it in the general direction of the crashed vessel.

It wasn't like anything she had ever seen before, and she gasped softly as she examined it. The technology used here had to be hundreds of years more advanced than anything built by humans, but it was definitely a human design and not one of the weird bio-ships that the Squids would use. The twisted and sputtering metal hadn't taken to the crash particularly well, as was to be expected, but surprisingly the ship hadn't exploded upon impact as she might have thought it would. Either it had been very short of fuel when it crashed, possibly the reason for its crash, or whatever technology it used to powers its engines was less prone to explosions than those she was familiar with.

She scrambled over to the ship and pried open the hatch, which came loose in her hands and she dropped to the ground in a twisted heap. "Is anyone alive in here? Are you alright?" she called out in standard English into the smoking cabin, coughing slightly, hoping that whoever might be here spoke English.

Turning her light toward the front of the cockpit revealed two women in the seats. One of them was moving to remove her seat restraints, while the other appeared to be dead or unconscious. "I'm... I'm alright," replied the dark-haired woman. She finished fumbling her seatbelt off and climbed over toward the blonde woman. "Nastya? Nastya, are you okay?"

Jannika moved over toward the blonde, stumbling a bit on the uneven footing and sloping floor. The blonde woman groaned softly, and blinked into the light. "I... I am alive," she said in a strained voice. "I could not tell you just what hurts, though. I hurt all over." Her English was fluent enough, but she spoke it with a thick accent, perhaps Russian.

"Let's get you out of here," the first woman said, glancing to Jannika. "Can you give me a hand here?"

"Of course," Jannika replied graciously, hanging the light from her belt again and going over to help remove the seat restraints and get the woman free. Her dress was scorched and burnt in places, but she didn't appear to be visibly bleeding or have any obvious broken bones. "Was there anyone else on board?"

"No, it was just us," said the dark-haired woman as they maneuvered the blonde out the hatch and onto the ground nearby. Unlike the blonde one, her accent was closer to the baseline English accent taught throughout the galaxy.

"It was a miracle the two of you survived that crash. My name is Jannika, by the way. Welcome to planet Midgard." She smirked faintly.

"I'm Tasha, and this is Anastasia." Tasha examined the other carefully for signs of injury, and seemed relieved that there didn't appear to be anything too serious.

"How did this happen, anyway?" Jannika wondered, turning to look curiously at the ship again. Just from a quick glance inside, she could tell that her immediate assessment was correct. It was like something from a science fiction movie had dropped right out onto her front yard. "Where are you from? Where did you _get_ this ship? What does it run on?"

Tasha chuckled lightly. "Slow down, slow down. One question at a time. It's something of a long story, so bear with us for the moment, please?"

Anastasia smirked. "This happened because Natasha fails at piloting a ship."

"Hey, do I _look_ flight certified to you?" Tasha said with a wry grin. "We're just lucky that the emergency auto-pilot kicked in at the last minute and managed to slow us down enough to not be turned into a steaming pile of goo."

"We should get you two inside," Jannika murmured. "And what's left of this ship, for that matter. At least nobody's going to notice you came in, seeing as you just hit the only sensor tower in this area. I'll just claim it was another meteor impact, no big deal."

"Why the secrecy?" Tasha wondered. Anastasia groaned softly and was slowly trying to bring herself to her feet again, albeit a bit unsteadily.

Jannika looked over at them. "Do you _want_ everyone to know that you're here with a heap of advanced technology? Do you two even have a sapience record?"

"A what?" Tasha said.

Jannika smirked. "Thought so. I took a wild guess, judging by your ship, to figure that you're not from around here, at the very least, wherever you might be from. If you haven't taken the Sapience Test, you're going to be considered Class-X, and Class-X entities have no rights or priveleges. You're not even considered sentient beings until you take that test. Anyone could steal from you, kidnap you, even murder you without repercussions."

Tasha frowned, looking a bit worried. Anastasia turned toward the ship and said, "I see. Do you have someplace we could keep our ship until it could be repaired, then? And how might one take this Sapience Test?"

"Yeah, it'll fit in the hangar near my house, easily," Jannika said. "It's too big to move manually, of course. I'll take you two to the house and show you some spare rooms where you can rest and get cleaned up, then I'll fire up the heavy lifter and haul it inside. Okay?"

"Sounds good to me," Tasha said, nodding.

"After we are settled in, I believe we will have a number of questions on both sides which must be answered," Anastasia commented.

"No kidding," Jannika said. "I'd love to take a closer look at this thing. But it's not going anywhere for now, so come on, let's get you girls inside. I'm sure you'd love a shower at this point, and I don't know what you might be used to, but we've got real hot-water showers at my place."

"That sounds nice," Tasha said. "Lead on."

Jannika stepped around the wreckage of the sensor tower, pulling out her hand light again to shine along the path back to the house, and grinning eagerly at the prospect of getting her grubby little fingers into their technology and seeing what made it tick, so to speak. "It's almost midnight, so I doubt anyone's still awake at the house," Jannika said. "But don't worry about accidentally waking my mom. The walls are pretty soundproof and she could sleep through an earthquake anyway."

"Do you have a basement?" Tasha asked. "Or someplace else that could be sealed against the sun?"

"Yeah, we've got a spare room in the basement, why?" Jannika wondered, glancing over at her curiously.

"I've got a, er, skin condition," Tasha replied a bit uneasily. "I have to avoid direct sunlight, or I get really bad sunburns."

"Right then," Jannika said. "Basement it is." She glanced over at Anastasia. "And would you like another room, or would you prefer to bunk with Tasha?"

"One room for both of us will suffice," Anastasia said.

"Mkay then." They arrived back at the house, and Jannika flicked off the hand light and tucked it away, and took a left and headed downstairs. "This used to be my great-uncle's room, until he passed away a few years ago, so don't be too surprised if you come across anything we forgot to clean out. It won't bite you, honest. He was a tad... eccentric."

"Thank you, Jannika. You have been most kind," Anastasia said. "Do you, by chance, have any spare clothing that we could use?" She sheepishly indicated her burned dress.

"Ah, um," Jannika replied thoughtfully. "I'm afraid I don't have any dresses, and my pants would probably be too small for you, for how much taller you are than me. You'll have to ask my mom in the morning, sorry. Tasha could probably fit into my pants, though."

"That sounds good," Tasha said. "Crash landings do not make for a good fashion statement." She smirked.

Anastasia chuckled softly and nudged Tasha. "We just met her, and you're already trying to get into her pants? Tsk, you are _such_ a cad."

Jannika cleared her throat. "Right, I'll bring you down some clothes after I get the ship safely tucked away, before somebody decides to come along and run off with it or something."

"Thank you again for the help," Anastasia said, and she and Tasha went to head for the bathroom as Jannika left.

Such strange, strange people, Jannika thought to herself, shaking her head slightly as she headed out toward the hangar. She would dearly love to find out more about just where it was that they were from, and what it was like there, and not the least being what sort of neat gadgets and gizmos they'd brought with them.

She climbed down into the underground hangar and flipped a switch. A rumbling noise could be heard above as the large hangar doors slowly slid open to reveal stars in the clear night sky. The little ship wouldn't have any trouble fitting in here, and she wouldn't even have to move the two aircars parked in the hangar. Once the doors were fully open, she went over and climbed into the lifter and powered it up. It was primarily intended for moving crates of supplies, but it was perfectly capable of carrying something about the size of a standard aircar, and the strange futuristic ship wasn't much bigger than that.

As she flew off to pick it up, she had to wonder to herself if they were really _from_ the future, and what sort of ramifications that would have. But if they were from the future, shouldn't they know something about the Sapience Test? It was something of a big thing, and had been for quite a while now. Maybe they just had studied their history about as well as they'd studied piloting. She couldn't say.

When she got back to the crash site, thankfully there still wasn't anyone else about. The sensor tower had been only sporadically active anyway, so its suddenly going out entirely wouldn't attract too much attention. She landed next to the wreckage of the ship and maneuvered the lifter's arms around it carefully, trying not to damage it anymore than it already had been. With it safely in hand, she flew back to the hangar to drop it off.

That taken care of, she closed up the hangar again and got on the comm. "Central control, this is Jannika Kai. Sensor tower 87 is offline for the immediate future. Meteor impacted right on top of it. It'll be at least a week or two before I can get it online again. Kai out."

Jannika then headed back to the house, stopping by her room to pull out some clothes for Tasha on the way to the basement. The two women weren't in the bedroom when she came in, so she assumed they were still in the shower. She set the clothes on the bed and turned toward the door and was about to leave when the bathroom door opened. Jannika glanced over to see Tasha standing there with a towel draped around her shoulders and nothing else, not particularly concealing herself very well.

Blushing, Jannika looked away and said, "Sorry. I brought you some clothes. Your ship's safely in the hangar."

"Thanks," Tasha said, then came over and poked Jannika in the shoulder. "Relax, we're all women here, right?"

"Suppose," Jannika said with a faint shrug, though she didn't turn around. "How about I go fix you two something to eat and we can discuss things over dinner? Unless you girls would rather just get some rest first."

"I'm not hungry, but I'm sure Anastasia would love it," Tasha replied, glancing over toward the bathroom door as the blonde woman came out, wearing what looked to be one of Uncle Jarl's old bathrobes, and seeming none too pleased about it either. "How's dinner sound, Nastya?"

"Sounds good to me," Anastasia replied with a faint shrug.

"It's real food, too, and not those horrible space rations," Jannika said, turning around tentatively and seeing Tasha finishing pulling on the shirt she'd brought. "Unless wherever you're from you've actually got rations that taste like real food."

"Well, not _precisely_..." Tasha said. "Lead the way, dear Jannika. I doubt the world will collapse if we don't exactly look gorgeous with our hair neatly brushed."

"It won't?" Anastasia said jokingly.

Jannika chuckled and headed back upstairs and down the hallway to the kitchen. "Bear with me, as I'm not the best cook in the world, but I can guarantee it will probably be edible!" She opened up the kitchen cabinets and poked around a bit. "Make yourselves comfortable, and do tell me everything. I'm all ears. Are you from the future or something?"

The other two women took seats around the kitchen table. "Not... exactly," Tasha said. "We're from an alternate universe."

"Two alternate universes," Anastasia corrected her.

"Right," Tasha said. "In my universe, it's currently the thirty-first century, while in Anastasia's universe, it's the twenty-third. What is it here?"

"The year is 2508," Jannika replied, putting some water on to boil. "So, alternate universes. You're not from the future, but you're from the future, sort of?" She scrunched up her face and peered over at Tasha.

"Sort of, not really," Tasha said with a shrug.

"Although our universes bear superficial resemblances, the timelines may have diverged centuries in the past," Anastasia explained. "Nothing like the events in my universe happened in the history of Natasha's universe, and I expect the same to be true for here as well."

"Thank you, Nastya," Tasha said with a smirk. Jannika was a bit surprised. With Anastasia's thick accent, she hadn't expected the woman to have such a fluent grasp of English, especially with regards to obscure technical matters.

"Okay, so no needing to worry about accidentally changing the past or anything if I take more than a passing glance at your spaceship," Jannika said wryly. The water was starting to bubble, so she turned and dumped the noodles in and stirred a bit at it absently. "You don't mind if I do, do you?"

"Not particularly," Tasha said. "It's not even exactly my spaceship. As you might have guessed, I'm not really the technical type."

"Heh," Jannika said in amusement. "You wanted to get it repaired, but neither of you has any clue how to repair it, I take it?" They nodded slightly. "Well, not to worry, I'll be your resident grease monkey, and I won't even bill you for it!" She paused thoughtfully for a moment and added, "Provided I can figure out how it works well enough to fix it, anyway. And provided it's not so badly damaged from the crash that it's still worth repairing and not just building a new ship from scratch or something. I haven't really taken too close of a look at it yet."

"That's okay," Tasha said. "I'm sure we can figure something out. So, can you tell us a bit about this place? Where are we exactly?"

Jannika dumped in a packet of seasoning into the pot and stirred it up a bit. "You're on the Norse colony of planet Midgard. You don't happen to speak Norse, do you?"

"Uh, afraid not," Tasha said, and Anastasia shook her head as well.

"That's going to be a problem. A lot of people speak English around here, but Norse is the primary language of the colony. We're all Norse here."

Anastasia looked at her a bit oddly and said, "You don't really... look Norse."

Jannika chuckled softly. "Yes, I'm sure my skin tone would be much more common in lattitudes considerably further south than old Scandinavia, but I'm Norse. Really. If only because I was born on planet Midgard. Honestly, I've probably got about as much Scandinavian blood as anyone else here, anyway." She poked at the pot and said, "Here we go, food's on." Jannika dished out some for herself and Anastasia, and glanced to Tasha and asked, "Are you sure you don't want any?"

"No, I'm fine, thank you," Tasha said. "Besides, ramen noodles were never really my thing." She smirked faintly.

"Hey, I did say not to expect gourmet cuisine," Jannika said, chuckling softly and settling in to eat. "So what's it like where you two are from?"

Tasha leaned back in her seat and looked off thoughtfully at nothing in particular. "My home universe calls itself the Karzan Galaxy. It went through way too many events of galactic proportions in a relatively short period of time for me to even get used to how things were, before they changed again. When I got out of there, it looked like things were taking a turn for the worse. I didn't like the looks of things and I feared my life was in danger, so I got myself out as soon as I could."

"Sounds fun," Jannika said dryly, turning to the other. "What about you, Anastasia?"

"It was not a pleasant place, either," Anastasia replied. "If you've seen any movies or read any books about post apocalyptic dystopias, you have some idea what it was like. Society had collapsed, most people were living on the streets or in rundown buildings, and a lot of information and knowledge was in danger of being lost forever. There was more going on than was immediately apparent, though, and the arrival of Natasha and her crewmates really stirred things up."

"You had a crew?" Jannika said, glancing aside to Tasha.

"The starship Perplexity, of the Karzan Exploratory Brigade," Tasha explained. "Its mission was to explore other universes and learn what it could about them. However, I... had a bit of a disagreement with the captain and some of the crew, and decided to go our own separate ways."

"Right," Jannika said, smirking. "So, did you steal the ship, or did they just put you on it and give you the boot?"

Tasha cleared her throat lightly. "Well, we didn't exactly ask permission to use it beforehand, but they didn't protest too vehemently or really try to stop us..."

"Do they even know which universe you wound up in?" Jannika asked.

"Probably not, no," Tasha said. "We're pretty much on our own here and completely at your mercy." She smirked wryly at Jannika. "You're not going to kidnap us and steal our ship, are you? Oh dear, you already have! Whatever will we do?"

Jannika laughed in amusement. "Heh, you don't have to worry about me. I'll help you out here any way I can. Sure, I've got a bit of an ulterior motive in that I'd really love to poke around at your ship and see if I can learn a thing or two from it, but at least I'm honest about it. I'll bring you in to take the Sapience Test in the morning so you can at least be considered sentient beings."

"Is after dusk good?" Tasha asked.

"Right, skin condition, forgot about that," Jannika said. "How's nineteen hundred hours sound?" At Anastasia's confused look, she added, "Seven o'clock?"

"Sounds good to me," Tasha said. "Just be sure not to come in and try to wake me before sunset, please?"

"No problem."

"So are we going to have to take a crash course in the Norse language if we're going to want to get by here?" Tasha asked.

"Well, probably, if you wanted to hang around on this out-of-the-way planet for very long," Jannika said with a shrug. "English should be enough to get you by for the most part, though. But the only place you could reasonably get a job with only English would be the Midgard Research Center. English is the language of science, apparently. Did you have any particular plans when you decided to come here, or were you just glad to get away from trouble no matter where you were ending up?"

"The latter, more or less," Tasha said, chuckling softly. "While I liked the idea of exploring the universe and seeing new things, I liked the idea of not being screwed over by one thing or another better."

"Not to worry," Jannika said. "Things are pretty quiet around here, for the most part. Midgard's something of a backwater colony. You shouldn't run into _too_ much trouble out here. I'm sure you'll at least get a breather before someone starts trying to screw you over." She grinned at Tasha.

"That's reassuringly," Tasha replied dryly.

Seeing that Anastasia had finished eating, Jannika went to clear off their plates. "I should probably get some sleep, myself," she said. "It's late, and I was out there all afternoon trying to repair that sensor tower before your ship slammed into it. Feel free to make yourselves at home if you're not tired yet. I'll see you tomorrow evening?"

"Yes, thank you, Jannika. For everything," Tasha said. "Sleep well."

Jannika left them there and headed off to her rooms to take a shower herself and get some sleep. She wasn't too worried about them getting into any sort of trouble at the moment. She didn't really have any reason to believe that they were anything but what they claimed to be, as incredible as it might seem. Sure, people had theorized the existence of alternate realities and how they might work, but nobody had ever actually proven anything. Until now. And just one look at their ship made her inclined to believe them. They might be working on some pretty out-there things over at Pandora Corp, but if they had stolen a prototype of some sort, she'd like to think she'd have heard something about it long before they'd turned up here.

She was overthinking things again, she told herself. She was still going to get a damned good look at their ship. But it could wait till tomorrow.

* * *

Jannika woke late that afternoon, and headed down to the kitchen to get a bite to eat of something resembling a particularly unhealthy breakfast. She'd go out and take a look at the ship afterward, figuring she'd have a few hours to poke over it before waking them up. Interdimensional jet lag must be hell even if it weren't for Tasha's whole sun allergy thing.

Unfortunately, her mother was in the kitchen when she got there. "Jannika!" Mom said. "Don't tell me you just woke up? When did you go to bed?"

"I was out late working," Jannika said, sighing internally in resignation. Mom would definitely force her to eat something healthy instead for breakfast. "And I've got a lot of work ahead of me, too. The sensor tower is down, and I mean _down_ as in laying on the ground."

"And that couldn't have waited for daylight?" Mom said, shaking her head and rolling her eyes. "There now, sit down and let me fix you up some eggs and toast. Eggs are good for you. You should eat more of them."

"Eggs are good for you again?" Jannika replied, reluctantly taking a seat at the table. "I thought scientists were saying they were bad for you not long ago."

"The latest studies indicate that eggs are quite excellent for your health," Mom insisted, working on preparing some food and munching on a slice of toast herself as she did so.

"But I don't even like eggs," Jannika muttered miserably.

"You're going to eat your eggs, young lady, and you'll like them, too," Mom said.

Jannika sighed softly and resigned herself to her fate. She was twenty years old, hardly a little girl anymore, but she tolerated allowing her mother to live with her still. It would feel wrong to kick her own mother out of the house she was raised in, even if Mom did nothing useful and it was Jannika who paid the bills now.

"So do you have another party tonight?" Jannika asked.

"Not tonight, honey. I'll be home tonight. Or did you want to go see a movie or something with your dear mother?"

"No, no thanks, Mom, I do have a lot of work to do," Jannika replied hastily. "Central will kill me if I don't get that tower up and online again soon."

"Oh, alright, but try not to stay out too late tonight. Here's your breakfast." She scooped the scrambled eggs onto a plate and slid it in front of Jannika. "Be sure to eat all your eggs." With that, Mom quickly washed her hands and headed out of the kitchen again.

"Eat all your eggs," Jannika muttered. She went over and grabbed a jar of salsa from the fridge, smothered her eggs in it, and then proceeded to dig in. "Much better."

Once dinner was done, she headed out to the hangar and flipped on the lights. The wrecked ship was exactly where she'd left it. The damage looked even worse than it had from last night's cursory examination. A more thorough look revealed that the systems appeared completely fried.

"This thing is totalled," Jannika murmured to herself. "I don't know how I'm ever going to get it to fly again." Well, if not, she could at least try to learn something from it. Curious as to how it worked, she climbed back into the warped wreckage of what appeared to be the engine compartment. There was the faint yellowish glow of something still intact inside, and she expected it to be the crystalline wiring from the ship's AI. However, what she pulled out was a large crystal, almost as big as her pinky finger. "Now what in the universe is this?" she said softly, turning it over in her fingers.

She could have sworn it looked like luminite at a glance, but she had never seen it in the form of a crystal so large before, only in the hair-thin wiring used in the circuitry of an artificial intelligence. Could this be what they were using to power their engines? There didn't appear to be anything else even remotely resembling a fuel supply or power source, and so far as she could tell, all the power conduits seemed directed to be taking energy from the crystal itself. Very interesting.

The drive itself was far more advanced than anything she had ever seen, and she really doubted that even Pandora Corp could have managed something like this by now. This was obviously not a prototype, but a stable design that had probably been mass-produced for some time. There must be something back here which allowed them to jump between alternate universes like that, but at the moment, damned if she could figure out just what it was, or if it was even separate in any way from the normal functionality of the interstellar drive. She couldn't even be certain if the ship travelled through hyperspace or used some other method entirely to go from one place to another.

"I feel like a caveman trying to make sense of a pocket calculator," Jannika muttered. She would have to ask them for what information they could tell her, even if it was just the basic functionality that any peon would know.

"Jannika!" her mother's voice called from the entrance to the hangar. "I'm heading to town to go to the store, do you need anything?" As she approached, she said, "What is this piece of junk?"

Jannika swore under her breath and severely hoped that her non-technologically-inclined mother would fail to notice that there was anything particularly out of the ordinary about the vessel. "Oh, this thing?" she said innocently, crawling out of the compartment as she quickly tried to think up a story. "Some friends of mine brought it to me to fix, like I didn't have enough to do as it is. They'll be staying over at the house for a while. I put them down in Uncle Jarl's room."

"I really wish you would tell me beforehand when your friends from the internet decide to drop in," Mom chided her. "Well, have fun, but don't let it get in the way of the work you actually get paid for. I hope, now that you've got real life friends here, that you actually go out and do something instead of work all the time, too. How long will they be staying?"

"Don't know, it might take me a while to get this fixed, but I promised them I'd fix it," Jannika said. "Might be a few weeks."

"I'd better be sure to bring extra groceries, then," Mom said, shaking her head a bit. "Don't work too hard, you hear me?"

"Yes, Mother," Jannika said in exasperation, smirking as she climbed back into the compartment again. There was much yet to be done, and while she'd certainly need to try to get the tower fixed soon, she found this far, far more interesting at the moment, even if she didn't understand everything. She felt like a kid in a store full of bright and shiny toys... all of them with no instruction manuals.


	2. Sapience Test

Jannika lost track of the time while poking around at the ship, and it was seven thirty that evening before she got back to the house again. There wasn't any sign of them upstairs, so she climbed down to the basement and opened the door. "Good morning, I--"

She cut off abruptly when she saw the two of them were lying on the bed, more or less naked, the blonde one on top and they appeared to be necking at first. Then Anastasia lifted her head and looked over at her, and Jannika saw there was blood, a neat pair of piercing marks on the side of the woman's neck.

"Helvíti..." Jannika murmured, backing away from the door. "Sorry, didn't mean to interrupt any... bizarre, kinky fetishes..."

"I can explain!" Tasha said hastily. "This isn't what it looks like!"

Anastasia put in helpfully, "Actually, I think it is exactly what it looks like."

Tasha leaned over and licked at Anastasia's neck, and when Jannika looked again, the blood and the wound were gone. "Just a moment," Tasha said. "We'll just get dressed and I'll explain everything, 'kay?"

"Right..." Jannika said, backing out into the hallway and closing the door behind her, not entirely certain that she really wanted to know. That was very weird. She leaned against the far wall and rubbed her eyes, trying not to think too hard about what she'd just seen. Wherever they were from, they clearly didn't have much of a nudity taboo, either.

A minute later, Tasha opened the door again and came out into the hallway. The two of them were thankfully fully clothed again, wearing what they had been last night. "Sorry about that, Jannika," Tasha said. "You didn't knock and we'd lost track of the time a bit."

"Knocking doesn't work too well around here. Doors and walls are too thick to hear anyone trying to shout through them even if you heard me knocking at all," Jannika replied with a shrug. "Don't worry about it. I'll, uh, fix you some more ramen gourmet if you really want..."

"If you like, I have some rudimentary skill in cooking," Anastasia offered.

"I've already eaten," Tasha said, licking her lips in an unsettling manner.

"Alright, Anastasia can cook, then," Jannika said, then looked oddly at Tasha. "What the hell was that all about, anyway?"

"This is going to take a bit of explaining, I think," Tasha said, nodding toward the stairs.

Jannika sighed softly and the three of them headed up toward the kitchen again. Her mother was thankfully nowhere in sight. Whatever those two were up to, she really didn't want her mom hearing about it. Anastasia proceeded to poke around the kitchen, seeing what was kept where and what sorts of things they had on hand. The place was well-stocked with the extra groceries that her mother had said she'd bring, and Anastasia had little trouble finding something and deciding on what to make.

"Alright, you better sit down for this," Tasha said. Jannika obligatorily took a seat at the table. "I don't know what things are like around here or what sorts of beings you're used to having around, but, you see, I'm a vampire."

"You're a vampire," Jannika repeated matter-of-factly, staring at Tasha as if she'd just, in all seriousness, proclaimed herself a pretty pink unicorn. "Okay, you're a vampire. Makes about as much sense as anything else." She reached up and rubbed her head a bit.

"I'm serious," Tasha said. "I'm a real, honest-to-whatever, blood-sucking, sun-fearing vampire."

"You're a vampire. Right," Jannika said. "Right, I believe you, okay? After seeing your ship, you could tell me you're Queen Elizabeth the First on a little jaunt through time and space, and I wouldn't be able to argue with you."

"I don't think I really look like her, do I?" Tasha said with a smirk.

"Hell, you could tell me you _are_ Queen Elizabeth the First, _and_ a vampire, and over a thousand years old or so."

"Actually, I've only been a vampire for a few years," Tasha said. "I'm about as old as I look, not much older than you are."

"So how does that work, anyway?" Jannika wondered.

Further discussion on the matter, however, was put off as the kitchen door swished open to admit Jannika's mother. "Ah, there you are," said Mom, sniffing at the air. "Mm, something smells good."

"I am making scalloped potatoes and ham," Anastasia said. "Would you like some?"

"Oh, that sounds nice," Mom said. "Jannika, dear, you should pay more attention. You could learn a thing or two around the kitchen here."

Jannika smirked faintly and said. "Right. Girls, this is my mom, Madison Kai. Mom, meet Tasha and Anastasia."

"A pleasure to meet you, Mrs. Kai," Anastasia said politely.

"Please, call me Maddie. No need for formalities in my house."

"As you wish, Maddie," Anastasia said.

"Anastasia," Mom said thoughtfully. "That's a lovely name. Are the two of you from Russia, dear girl? I hear that's a lovely planet, though I haven't been there myself."

"Yes. Russian," Anastasia replied quickly.

"Russian is your native tongue, I presume, but you speak English very well," Mom said. She didn't know the half of it.

"I am also fluent in French, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, and a peculiar French-English creole I heard somewhere once."

"Impressive," Mom said. "You must be highly educated and intelligent."

"Dinner's ready," Anastasia said. She set out three plates for them and put out bowls on the table with the potatoes and some fresh peas. "Help yourselves."

As she dished out her own food, Mom looked toward Tasha and said, "Are you not eating, dear? You should really eat something. This is good, healthy food here."

"No, no, I'm not hungry," Tasha said, raising a hand.

"Your friend went to all this trouble to make this food, and you won't eat it?" Mom said. "It's delicious!"

Jannika sighed internally, not wanting to see where this was going and looking to Tasha pleadingly to not tell her mother what Tasha had told her. Thankfully, Tasha seemed to have the same idea.

"Oh, alright, maybe a little, but I had a big meal earlier and couldn't really stomach much more," Tasha said.

Mom put out a plate for Tasha, and to her horror, scooped out a big spoonful of potatoes and a fair helping of peas onto it. "Eat up, girl. Vegetables make you strong and healthy."

"Oh, I don't know if I can eat all this."

"Do try, Tasha dear," Mom said. "Just because you've been eating junk food all day doesn't mean you should skimp on the healthy food, too. Or did you eat an entire pizza or something? Kids these days."

Tasha tentatively tried a bit of potato and commented, "Mm, yes, it's quite good."

Seeming satisfied at that, Mom stopped pressuring Tasha for the moment and turned back to Anastasia. "So tell me, what brought you to Midgard if you don't speak Norse? Just wanting to take a vacation and get away from it all, or just coming to see Jannika I bet?"

"Oh, a little of each," Anastasia replied. Mom was paying too much attention to Anastasia to notice that Tasha was practically gagging on every bite she forced down.

"I always tell her to be careful of who she meets on the internet, because you never know who might be a scary axe murderer, but frankly, I'd be more worried about finding axe murderers in town, primarily the sort who think they're Vikings or something. You seem like a pleasant enough couple of young ladies."

Anastasia chuckled. "Yes, we are definitely not axe murderers."

"Excuse me," Tasha murmured. "Need to use the bathroom."

"You haven't finished your peas!" Mom protested as Tasha ducked out of the room.

Jannika interrupted any further protest with, "Mom, I'll be heading into town after dinner with my friends. Need to pick up some parts for their ship and take care of some things."

"Oh, try not to stay out too late, honey," Mom said. "There's scary people in town at night. Be sure to take your mace."

"Do you mean pepper spray or a blunt object?" Jannika asked wryly.

"Either one," Mom said, finishing up her food and dabbing at her mouth with a napkin. "I'm going to bed. Good night, girls."

She headed out of the kitchen again, and Tasha returned momentarily afterward. "Is she gone yet?"

"Yes, you can relax now," Jannika reassured her. "And you don't have to finish your peas, either. Sorry about that."

"It's okay," Tasha said. "It's to be expected when dealing with people who you really would rather not find out about that little detail."

"And a good thing, too. She'd completely flip over it."

"I'm damned well going to keep that quiet for the moment," Tasha said. "I don't expect everyone to be as open-minded or understanding as you. I don't even know if vampires exist or not in this universe. Even more dangerous if they do, because then there might be vampire hunters who actually know what to look for."

"So how does it work, anyway? Should I rid the house of garlic and holy symbols?" Jannika asked.

Tasha shook her head. "No, and no. Those won't exactly do much to me. The main worry would be sunlight, of course. Fire isn't a good thing either, but then, fire isn't pleasant for _most_ people."

"Heh. Mom's going to be annoyed if I stay out all night again, but then, I'm not too worried about what she thinks of my sleep schedule as it is." She went over to clear the table and clean the plates, and scraped off the last of Tasha's peas into the trash.

"Did you make much progress on the ship?" Tasha asked.

"Afraid not," Jannika said. "It's way over my head to decipher in one day, and I'm going to want your help in pointing out what you _do_ know about it. First things first, though, we should get identification set up for you and get you tested, before anyone finds out you're basically non-entities. Like my mom."

"Right then, let's go," Tasha said, nodding.

"You must tell us more about this Sapience Test," Anastasia said. "How does it work?"

Jannika gestured and led the way back to the hangar where her car was parked. "Every sentient being in the galaxy is required to take the Sapience Test to have the rights and priveleges associated with their given rating. There are six different ratings. Class-I, infant. Class-C, child. Class-J, juvenile. Class-M, mature. Class-S, superior. And of course, Class-X, for those who haven't been rated. They correspond roughly with the mental age as for a human belonging to certain age groups, and for normal humans it's usually fairly accurate."

"I'll presume that Class-S is for those with greater than human standard intelligence?" Anastasia asked.

"Right," Jannika said, making a face. "Most people wind up Class-M, of course. Most Squids and fully sentient AIs wind up as Class-S, as well as most human telepaths and a small percentage of other miscellaneous humans."

"Excuse me, did you say Squids?" Tasha said in puzzlement.

"Sorry," Jannika said. She reached over and opened the doors down into the hangar. "They're aliens. Look like, well, squids. I've never actually seen one myself, though."

Tasha climbed down the stairs after her and looked around the hangar, peering over at the aircars. "Are those space-capable vehicles?"

"No, just atmosphere," Jannika explained. "We're a fair ways from town. Midgard's got the whole 'one city per planet' thing going on, what with what a tiny, backwater colony it is." She went over to her aircar and opened up the hatch. "Hop in. I actually know how to fly this thing." She gave them a wry smirk.

The two of them chuckled faintly as they climbed inside and took a seat behind Jannika. "So," Anastasia said as they headed off to town. "What does Class-S get that M does not? I presume that Class-M would receive most of the benefits that being of adult age would normally convey."

"Right, what was based off age in the past is now based entirely off sapience rating," Jannika explained, making a face and trying to decide just how much to tell them. It probably wouldn't matter anyway that she'd been cheated out of Class-S herself. "Some jobs, such as running for public office, require being Class-S. Logically, you'd want the smart people in charge, right? You wouldn't want your leaders to be below the curve, I suppose."

"Makes sense," Anastasia said.

"I'm going to have to falsify your identification, of course," Jannika said. "That shouldn't be a problem. If anyone asks, tell them you're from planet Russia. That's a small colony, like this one, but big enough that someone could get lost in the mix. Hopefully nobody will bother double-checking it."

"I'm feeling Russian today," Tasha said wryly. "I suppose my name is close enough, and I'm probably descended from somebody from old Russia at some point or another, but I'm actually American. From Earth, even! Well, not your Earth, anyway."

"Hey, you probably have as much Russian in you as I do Scandinavian," Jannika said with a grin. "Here we are." She brought them in to park near a large building near the middle of the colony. "Midgard Administration. Let's see about getting you two set up."

She climbed out of the aircar and headed in through the lobby with them in tow, and into the records department. Jannika knew her way around the colony's computers as well as, if not better than, their experts, so she was quite confident that she could construct false IDs for them without any problems. She went over to one of the terminals and proceeded to bypass their security measures.

"Easy enough," Jannika murmured. "I'm in. Okay, let's do Anastasia first. Full name?"

"Anastasia Karanovna Yershova."

"Wow, you really _are_ Russian," Jannika said with a chuckle. Drilling Anastasia for the information, she proceeded to put in her birthdate as a twenty-eight-year-old, as modified to be appropriate for the time period, and the other necessary information.

"Is it ready?"

"Just a couple more things and... there." Jannika pressed another button, and the machine spat out a neatly-laminated holographic identification card with Anastasia's picture and information on it. "Just had to convince it this was legit. Don't lose that card. You'll need to swipe it through the test to update it with your results and rating. Let's get Tasha taken care of next, before anyone notices we're here monkeying with the terminals. Full name?"

"Natasha Millicent Johnson."

"Millicent?" Anastasia said with a crooked grin.

"Yeah, yeah, it was my grandmother's name," Tasha said, smirking.

They went through the procedure again and entered the appropriate information, and the machine ejected another card for Tasha, which Jannika handed to her. "There we go. All set for the testing. Right this way."

She led them down the hallway to the testing chambers. The route was all too familiar now, and she thought back on just how many times she had taken the test, and still wound up as Class-M. She must have been retaking it every couple months while she was a teenager, constantly convinced that this time, she would get Class-S. It had been three years now since she last bothered taking it.

"Just step right inside and relax, and try to be honest. It'll know if you're lying, so don't even bother," Jannika explained. "And the only thing that'll hurt is your results if it thinks you have the mentalstate of an adolescent. Who's up first?"

Anastasia and Tasha looked to one another, and then both said, "I'll go," simultaneously.

Anastasia chuckled and said, "Go on, I can wait. No rush here."

"It should only take about twenty minutes," Jannika said.

"Right," Tasha said, nodding. "No pressure here." She stepped up to the door, which slid aside to admit her, and stepped inside.

Jannika poked around at a nearby news terminal that was flashing the day's headlines. "At least there's not going to be many people around this late. There's news here if you want to take a look. Not that it's really much of news, anyway. Local crap. And nothing _ever_ happens around here."

"Worth a look, anyway," Anastasia said, shrugging as she peered over at the words and images streaming across the screen. "Vikings?"

"Oh, them? Yeah, we've got our own lovely brand of local space pirates who think they're Vikings, and have taken the whole looting and pillaging thing to heart. They're not brave enough to hit Midgard itself. Usually they stick to the outlying mining bases and transport ships."

"And you say this place is boring," Anastasia said, smirking at her. "At least they're nice enough to display the news in both English and Norse. The most widespread news sources back at home, such as they were, tended to be restricted to Guttertalk. Only the really academic news was actually in English."

"Guttertalk?" Jannika wondered, raising an eyebrow.

"That French-English creole I mentioned," Anastasia explained. "Though it has words pilfered from probably dozens of other languages tossed in for good measure, it's mostly French and English. It's the most-used language in my world's version of North America."

"Huh. What's it like?"

"Tis booka novy and black," Anastasia said. "They pense it bonnie and gay, and pense any who don't grok to be a straight gop."

Jannika blinked. "Translation?"

Anastasia chuckled. "It's very new and cool. They think it good, well, 'right', and think any who don't understand to be, um, boring straight-edged upper-class jerks."

"I see," Jannika said, still blinking. "You come from a very strange world."

Anastasia shrugged. "You could say that. Those from my world might well say the same thing about yours, though. Personally, though, I'd rather be here at the moment."

"In other news," said the screen, "government agents have successfully countered a terrorist attack against the adminstrative center on planet Cornwall. This attack was believed to be targetted against the legal ruling body of the colony, including the local artificial intelligence, CORA. Several of the terrorists have been detained for further questioning with regards to the incident. Injuries and damages were, thankfully, minor."

After several minutes, Tasha came out of the testing chamber again. "Class-M," Tasha announced, holding up her card as proof.

"Congratulations," Jannika said with a smirk, and nodded to Anastasia, who went in next.

"That wasn't so bad," Tasha said. "I'd have expected it to like, pick my brain clean or something, or try to telepathically probe the hell out of me."

"Nah," Jannika said. "It's not really so much psychics, it does have to be able to handle any species it comes across. That's including artificial intelligence, too. And cyborgs of various sorts."

"So how does it work, then?"

Jannika shrugged. "I have no idea. The details of it tend to be kept a closely guarded secret to prevent anyone from tampering with the results. Kind of wish I knew how it worked myself. Heh. I suppose anyone wanting to tamper with their test results, and that could actually pull it off, is probably Class-S anyway."

"Doesn't it worry you a bit that your society is based around something you don't know the details of?" Tasha wondered, raising an eyebrow. "Does it bother you at all?"

"Did you know the details of everything that went on in yours?"

Tasha looked thoughtful for a moment and smirked. "More than most people, but there was way more out in the open than you might expect. Until things changed again, anyway."

"But yeah, it does worry me a bit, but it works perfectly well for the most part," Jannika said. "Sometimes the results are questionable, and I wouldn't say there's no margin for error, but for most purposes, it's fine."

Anastasia came out and grinned at them, lifting her ID card, and said, "Class-S."

"What, you?" Jannika said, feeling herself flushing a bit.

"I always knew she was smarter than me," Tasha said with a smirk.

"What happened? You were only in there for like ten minutes, tops!" She went over to peer at Anastasia's card, but sure enough, it was marked clearly with the word 'Superior' in a purple bar.

Anastasia shrugged. "I assume they found whatever they were looking for already."

"I don't believe it," Jannika murmured, rubbing her eyes. "Class-S..." She cleared her throat and looked up at Anastasia and said, "Well, congratulations. Maybe we should get home, and the two of you can see if you can help me with your ship."

"Yes, let's," Anastasia said, smiling.

"Don't know if Ms. Super-Genius here or me will be much help, though," Tasha put in, nudging the blonde playfully. "But I'll tell you what I know."

Jannika headed back to the car, the others following. She was trying not to appear too bitter about the entire business. She had no reason to be, after all. They hadn't been raised in this society and didn't know about the full implications of the Sapience Test, she reasoned. And having a friend who was Class-S might be very helpful for some things...

* * *

Jannika peered over the dissassembled ship components that she had removed from the ship, strewn across the table. Some bits had been still fairly intact after the crash, and she had carefully removed them so as not to damage them further. She held up the glowing yellow crystal before Tasha and Anastasia, gazing thoughtfully into its depths and wondering what secrets it might hold.

"What," she said slowly, looking up from the crystal at them, "is this?"

"Oh, that?" Tasha said. "Luminite. It's used to power the ship."

"I've never seen luminite used as a primary power source before," Jannika said. "Not that I don't think it could be done, obviously, since your ship seemed to be doing perfectly fine with it until it crashed into my sensor tower, but there's regulations about that sort of thing."

"What kind of regulations?" Anastasia asked, raising an eyebrow.

"The AIs don't want luminite to be used in anything except AI systems. They never went into detail on why, but nobody had any reason to argue with them seeing as luminite is a _must_ for a good AI system. You can't make a truly sentient AI without it. Anything less is just a cheap imitation."

"Our ship didn't have an AI in it," Tasha said. "Luminite crystals have been used as a primary power source in Karzan for over five hundred years. They weren't really used in robots much, that I know of at least."

"I'm sure the AIs around here would be pleased as puppies to know about that," Jannika said with a smirk. She set the crystal down carefully on the table and moved on to the next object. It was a large box with a rectangular slot in one side, some buttons, and what might be a video output display. "So, what about this thing?"

"That's a replicator," Tasha said.

"A replicator," Jannika said. "Helpful. What, precisely, does it replicate?"

"Just about anything you like, though it can't handle heavier or more complex materials," Tasha said. "Small, portable replicators like this are normally just used for food, clothing, and other basic supplies."

Jannika frowned faintly and looked at the device thoughtfully, and said, "This I have to see." With some tweaking, she managed to hook up the crystal as a power source for the replicator and bring it online. It wasn't too difficult at least, as luckily they'd been designed to match. She poked at the buttons on the front, and it proceeded to bring up images of different types of food.

"It normally has a voice interface, also," Tasha said helpfully. "Though I'm not sure if it's still connected or working properly."

Jannika raised an eyebrow at her, and turned to the device and said clearly, "Make me a chicken sandwich."

There was a glow and a humming sound from the compartment in the front of the device, and an object appeared in the slot. A whole chicken, feathers and all, surrounded in haphazard slices of bread.

"Um. Cancel that order. Make it go away."

"Okay, so the logic circuits appear to be damaged," Tasha said with a chuckle. "You'll need to use the recycler to get rid of it."

"Which one is the recycler?" Jannika asked, not particularly wanting to touch this... thing that it had created.

Tasha pointed helpfully to another box with a sort of chute entrance. "That one."

"Right." The two objects had been next to one another and connected in the ship, and had probably remained intact due to being near the center of the ship, so Jannika hooked them up again how they had originally been, bringing the recycler online. Gingerly, she removed the entirely-too-literal chicken sandwich from the replicator and shoved it into the chute. Carefully she poked through the slot and peered inside to see that it was gone.

"I wouldn't do that if I were you," Tasha warned. "It might be damaged also, and wouldn't want your hand getting 'recycled' -- or your head."

"Uh, right," Jannika said, quickly backing away from the machine. She reached over and deactivated the replicator again and removed the power source from it, just in case. "Anything else here that I should know about?"

"Do your ships also use artificial gravity?"

"Artificial gravity?" Jannika said in surprise. "Odin's eyeball, no. You have it?"

"Karzan has had it for about as long as we've been in space," Tasha said. "I'm not too certain just how it works, of course, but I know it's there."

"We have to spin our space stations to generate gravity," Jannika said. "To have actual gravity on something this small is nothing short of remarkable."

"And I take it that you have some sort of interstellar drive, but haven't gotten to interdimensional yet."

Jannika nodded. "That would be an accurate assumption. I just have to wonder on a comparison with speed and method for that."

"The drive used on this ship works by opening a sort of doorway into hyperspace," Tasha said. "Then it flies through hyperspace to its destination. It took a week, tops, for me to get from the heart of the Empire to an outlying colony, maybe five thousand lightyears distant."

Jannika blinked. She didn't even need to bother doing the math. "You're kidding me. _That_ fast?" She let out a low whistle and leaned back in her chair. "You know, on the open market, between all this stuff, you could buy the whole galaxy for that. I wouldn't, though."

"What do we really need money for?" Tasha said. "Or the galaxy, for that matter? Personally, I'd rather all this stuff didn't fall into the hands of everyone in the galaxy. Or worse, into the hands of whatever the local corrupt government or corporation might be. You just know they'd just get a monopoly on it and abuse it for their own purposes."

Jannika chuckled. "Was that an astute observation of your little time here, or are governments and corporations really that much the same in every universe?"

Anastasia commented, "I think they're really just that much the same, nine times out of ten, yes."

"Okay, that settles it then," Jannika said. "We'll keep this to ourselves. This can be our nice little top secret bunker. Thankfully, my mother barely knows how to fly a car, never mind recognize highly advanced technology from the next millennium. Just be careful what you mention to her, not to mention anyone else. The _last_ people who need to find out about this are the scientists down at the Midgard Research Center. They'd be all over this place in a heartbeat if they had any inkling what we have down here."

"Agreed," said Tasha and Anastasia.

"For now, best head to bed, though. It's only an hour till dawn, and we don't want any severe sunburns or anything," Jannika said, smirking faintly at Tasha. She might not have believed Tasha were really a vampire, but it was difficult to deny what she had seen with her own eyes. And since the woman didn't seem inclined to go ripping out people's throats at random or the like, it didn't really matter to _her_ what sort of diet she had.

As the three of them headed back to the house, Tasha asked, "Do you think you'll be able to get it working again?"

"At this point? No," Jannika admitted. "I'm way over my head here and wouldn't even know where to begin. You can borrow my car if you need to go anywhere in town, but only if you promise to actually learn to fly it first." She smirked broadly.

"Thanks," Tasha said with a wry grin.


	3. Research Work

Tasha flew the aircar in toward the Midgard Research Facility, Anastasia in the passenger seats behind her. They'd managed to get their flight certifications last week that let them legally fly atmospheric vehicles. It would still take further training and passing more tests before it would be legal for them to fly an interstellar vessel, but this was sufficient for the moment.

Tasha brought in the car and landed it in the parking lot, and the two of them climbed out and headed inside. The place was sterile and clean, but at least everything here was labelled in English. For all the crash course they'd taken in basic Norse, only Anastasia had any real working knowledge of it now. Tasha was lucky to be able to ask where the nearest bathroom was. She wasn't at all bitter about Anastasia being "smarter" than her, like Jannika had seemed -- if anything, she was amused about it. What was really the big deal, anyway?

"Good evening," said the secretary at the front desk. "What can I do for you ladies tonight?"

"We've heard that you're hiring employees for the night shift?" Tasha said tentatively. From what she'd heard of the work they did here, it sounded like a great time.

"Ah, yes." The secretary tapped a few buttons on her console. "Please fill out the applications and testing on the terminals in the room to your right. Thank you."

Tasha nodded politely to her and headed off into the room indicated, labelled 'Public Terminals', Anastasia following. It was a small room with several terminals set up, each displaying cheerful, friendly welcome messages to visitors and happily animated screens. Tasha smirked faintly at one of them and took a seat at the far end, Anastasia grabbing the one beside her.

"Nice place," Tasha said in amusement, looking down at the bouncing animated robot figure waving hello to her. She selected 'Job Application' from the menu and went in to start filling out the form.

"Do you think they'll hire us?" Anastasia asked.

"I don't see why not. Admittedly, they wouldn't recognize the college I went to, of course, but I did go to college. I majored in biology. I _know_ the sorts of things they're doing here."

"I am certain you will have no problem getting the job, Tasha. But your knowledge of the material and technology they use is far beyond mine. I can surely learn, but it will take time."

"Relax, Nastya. You're smart. You'll figure it out quickly enough." Tasha chuckled softly. Once the basic application form was filled in, it directed her toward a test on the subject matter of the job she was applying for. The questions listed were quite simple -- First year biology, mostly. She had already finished the test and put in her application when she glanced over to see that Anastasia was still struggling with the test.

Anastasia sighed. "I am sorry. I do not even know this material. I never learned it, and this is not particularly my area of expertise. They are working on advanced biology far beyond anything my world ever dreamed of. It would be dishonest if I asked you for help with it, though."

"How about a crash course in basic biology?" Tasha said with a chuckle, getting up from her seat and circling around behind Anastasia's terminal. She leaned on her palms against the desk and looked down at her with a grin.

"I am listening," Anastasia said, leaning back in her seat and looking attentively up to Tasha.

Turning to the larger display on the far wall for assistance and reference, Tasha proceeded to give a rundown of her first year in biology at school. She didn't think it would be so bad if she didn't just answer the questions, but taught her a little about the material as well, though she suspected that someone might get suspicious if they were in here for _too_ long.

"I think I get it now," Anastasia said. "I still do not know if I can do the work, but that should cover the test at least."

"I'll try and teach you what I can in the meantime, but I'm a biologist, not much of a teacher," Tasha said. "Let's go, before somebody wonders just what we're doing in here."

"It is much appreciated," Anastasia said, rising from her seat and heading for the door with her.

"Thank you for your applications," the secretary in the lobby said, smiling at them. "We'll message you when we review the results. Did you find everything you need?"

"Yes, thank you," Tasha said, smiling back. "Have a nice night."

* * *

Jannika climbed down from the tower, wiping her brow with a cloth and looking up at the newly-repaired sensor tower. The lights were steady now and it appeared to be reading properly again. That should do the trick, if something else didn't fall out of the sky to slam into it.

"Central control, this is Jannika Kai," she said into the comm device. "Sensor tower 87 is again online and functional and should be transmitting data properly. Are you reading?"

"Affirmative," came the reply. "Good work, Ms. Kai. Those meteor impacts have been hell on the sensor grid. That's the third one this year that disrupted service."

Brushing off her hands, Jannika headed back to the house. She glanced up at the sky and saw her aircar was returning home, and braced herself briefly against another crash. Tasha, however, appeared to have the matter well in hand and came in for a perfect landing in the hangar, and Jannika breathed easily again. Chuckling to herself, she trudged off down the dirt path to the house, and waved at them at the entrance.

"How was town?" Jannika said with a grin.

"Didn't go to town," Tasha replied, chuckling as she headed inside, peering about in a paranoid manner for Jannika's mom.

"Oh? Don't tell me you were hanging out at the Research Center, were you?" Jannika smirked. "Told you no good would come of it."

"Yeah, but they look like they do such interesting work! It's right up my alley."

Tasha looked so excited and hopeful that Jannika felt bad dashing her hopes about it, so she bit her lip and kept quiet. She would certainly see for herself soon enough, and maybe things would work out better than Jannika feared, anyway. "I got the damned sensor tower up and running again," she said. "Now I can safely ignore the thing until it breaks again. Which will probably be tomorrow, but hey."

"Shall we get some dinner?" Anastasia said.

"I don't see Maddie around anywhere to force-feed me peas, so sure," Tasha said with a smirk.

"She's probably in bed by now," Jannika said, heading for the kitchen.

"So is that all you do all day?" Tasha asked. "You keep the sensor tower online?"

"Pretty much," Jannika said with a shrug. "It's a living, and it lets me work with machines. Even bloody annoying ones that break constantly for no good reason."

* * *

"Hey, girls," Jannika said. "I got a message in for you from the Midgard Research Center. Congratulations, you got the jobs. They want you in from twenty-two hundred to oh-five hundred, starting Monday."

"Great," Tasha said brightly, practically bouncing with excitement. "I get to play with DNA!"

"You know, your whole fascination with biology is a little bit disturbing, Tasha, especially coming from a vampire," Jannika pointed out.

"Bah, I picked biology as my college major long before I became a vampire. Back when I was all wanting to do something with my life and learn things, even if I did spend entirely too much time at college partying."

"Doesn't everyone?" Jannika said with a smirk.

"I did not," Anastasia put in helpfully.

"They still had functioning colleges on your world?" Tasha wondered, raising an eyebrow.

"Of sorts," Anastasia said. "Admittedly, I primarily wound up running what there was in my area."

"Reading books and exploring the internet doesn't really count as 'school'," Jannika commented, poking her. "If it did, they could count me as having had more than my lifespan worth of general schooling on various subjects."

"I was so excited at one point about learning biology in school," Tasha said.

"But then you realized there's more to biology than reproduction?" Anastasia chided with a wry grin.

"Hey, I do _not_ have a one-track mind!"

"Oh, right, there's the biological responses of pleasure receptors as well."

Jannika cleared her throat lightly. "You know, you two really need to get a room sometimes."

"What?" Tasha said innocently. "It's just witty banter!"

"Uh-huh."

* * *

"Ah, the new workers are here," a man in a lab coat said to greet them when Tasha and Anastasia arrived at work on Monday. "Welcome to the Midgard Research Center. I am Mr. Ian Woon, and I will be your supervisor for the night shift. Here, you'll need these." He tossed a pair of fresh, clean labcoats to them. "Put them on."

They pulled the labcoats on around their clothes. Tasha asked, "What is our assignment for today, Mr. Woon?"

"That's Mr. _Ian_ Woon. Never Mr. Woon, nor Ian Woon, and Odin forbid you dare call me merely Ian or Woon. Mr. Ian Woon. Got it?"

"Yes, Mr. Ian Woon, sir," Tasha said sheepishly.

"Take these datapads," Mr. Ian Woon said, handing a datapad to each of them. "They contain information which you need to know about our current projects, which frankly is not particularly much at this point, as well as the information which you need to know about your current assignments. Be sure to complete your assignments before the end of your shift. If they have not been completed by that point, you will remain here until they have been, for no extra pay. Is that understood?"

"Yes, sir," Tasha and Anastasia said.

"Good. Now get to it, and don't let me catch you slacking off until all your work is done." Mr. Ian Woon turned and headed out, leaving them to their work.

"Nice chap," Tasha said dryly, heading off to the room indicated on her assignment listing, while Anastasia went off down another hallway. She found herself in a chilly storeroom with various samples being kept in sealed vials for long-term storage. "Right, sort these, dispose of those, and move those other ones to another room," Tasha muttered to herself, reading out the display. "I suppose everyone has to start somewhere, even if it's just scientific janitorial work."

She shrugged and got to work. It didn't really bother her overly much, although it was a bit disappointing, but she figured the higher-ups who had been around longer and had more experience would be the ones getting the interesting jobs. She was done with most of the work in about an hour, and, wondering what they had assigned Anastasia to be cleaning or sorting, went off in search of her.

Tasha found her in another lab, frantically browsing over files on a nearby terminal, and looking positively relieved to see her. "Oh, Tasha, you have no idea how glad I am to see you."

"What's wrong? Got bored with cleaning?" Tasha asked, chuckling softly and coming up behind her to take a look at what files she was perusing. "Catching up on your biology studies?"

"That is precisely the problem!" Anastasia said. "I have no idea how to do the work that they have assigned me to do."

"Oh, it shouldn't be too tough for the first day on the job. They just had me cleaning and sorting some things. What's your assignment?"

She pulled up the clipboard and read carefully from it, "I need to analyze the biological test samples from the blood of thirty-six white mice in order to determine which variant of the... the... something compound is most effective."

Tasha raised an eyebrow and snatched the clipboard out of her hands and peered over it. "What? They have you doing actual biology work? Did I teach you too well the other day?" She chuckled softly.

"But I have no idea how to do this work! I don't even know what I am looking for!"

Seeing that Anastasia was on the verge of panic here, Tasha put a hand reassuringly on her shoulder. "Relax, Nastya, relax. I'm here and I'll help with it, okay? I'll show you how to do it."

"Thank you, Tasha. I knew I could count on you. I have merely been sitting here reading and hoping that you would show up, or I would not be getting anything done tonight."

With Tasha's help, they went through the test results in due order and got done with the work well before the end of their shifts, perhaps much to the appreciation of the mice in question, who were most inconvenienced by the requirement of taking samples of their blood for testing. Anastasia headed out to the water fountain for something to drink before their shift ended as they didn't have any further assignments at the moment.

"I just have to wonder why they gave you that assignment, but left me to do cleaning," Tasha murmured, leaning against the wall as Anastasia sipped her cup of water.

"I cannot say," Anastasia said. "Perhaps I had answered their questions better than I had thought."

"Shift's almost over. We should head home before it starts getting light out. Good thing Maddie, as irritating as she is, doesn't seem to mind us still hanging around too much."

They headed out to the car and flew back to the Kai residence and parked in the nearby hangar. Tasha took a glance at the mostly-dissasembled spaceship on her way to the stairs. Jannika must have been busy taking it apart to see how it worked. She had to wonder if the girl could actually put it back together again, but that wasn't too big of a concern just at the moment.

They found Jannika in the kitchen, munching on a bag of cheese-flavored potato chips. "Hey, girls. Welcome back. How was work?" Tasha could swear that she had some sort of smug, sarcastic look on her face.

"Jannika, is there something you haven't been telling us?" Tasha asked, pulling up a seat across from her and leaning on her elbows on the table.

"What, me?" Jannika said, feigning innocence.

Anastasia went over, picked up the bag of chips, sniffed at it, then tossed it disdainfully back on the table before heading to the fridge. "Sometimes the things you eat baffle me," Anastasia muttered. "I do not believe that is even natural."

"You're starting to sound like my mother."

"You're not answering my question," Tasha said. "When we got to work, Anastasia was assigned to analyzing blood samples, while I was set to cleaning. I wound up pretty much having to do her work for her. I thought it might have been because Mr. Ian Woon didn't like me or something, even though I hadn't really done anything, but the assignments had been drawn up for us because we'd even met him."

Jannika signed and sealed up the package again and shoved it into the cupboard. "Yes, Tasha, there's something I wasn't telling you. There _was_ a good reason why I suggested steering clear of the Research Center, and it wasn't just because they might discover you aren't really who you say you are. I doubt they'd even care too much unless they found out about the ship."

"What is it, then?" Tasha asked. Anastasia pulled a banana out of the fridge and sat down, peeling it.

"It's because Anastasia is Class-S, and you're only Class-M," Jannika said.

"What does that have to do with anything?" Tasha wondered in puzzlement. "I knew how to do the work and Nastya didn't."

"We did slightly cheat on my application test," Anastasia pointed out, taking a delicate bite of the banana.

"Still."

Jannika shook her head. "That has nothing to do with it. Even with identical credentials, they'll still pick the Class-S for a job over the Class-M. Yes, they're biased. They don't honestly believe that, all other things equal, that Class-S and Class-M are capable of doing the same jobs."

"That's ridiculous," Tasha spat. "What kind of a screwed up system is that?"

Jannika raised her hands helplessly. "I didn't set it up. Now you know why I'm sitting out here twiddling with a damned sensor tower. It pays well enough and gives me enough time for freelance activity that doesn't care what sapience class I fall under."

"This system is not particularly efficient," Anastasia commented. "Although the application tests were inaccurate, I am not inherently more capable than Natasha at executing a particular task. With a few years of learning, perhaps I would be more skilled than her in the field of biology, but that does not preclude the fact that she is still capable nonetheless."

"Exactly," Jannika said, grinning at her. "You would think that being 'smarter' would make the Class-S people realize what took you five seconds to figure out. But they've started to really like the fact that they're considered 'superior' than us peons. It's become something of an 'old boys' club', only it's a 'smart people club'. Now you see my dilemma."

Tasha snorted softly. "Well, _I'm_ certainly not going to stand for it. Is there any way around this system?"

"Not unless you're planning on getting a less-than-legitimate job," Jannika said. "I hear the Space Vikings don't really care about your sapience rating." She smirked at Tasha.

"Well, maybe there's a way to falsify the test results or something," Tasha said. "You said someone would have to be Class-S to understand the system it uses anyway, and hence it wouldn't really benefit them to cheat their own test results, but what if a Class-S tweaked the test results of someone else?"

"Theoretically possible, but where are you going to find a Class-S that both understands how the test system works and is willing to let 'dumb people' into the old boys' club?"

"I certainly do not understand the system," Anastasia helpfully put in. "I am afraid that it is far beyond my level of comprehension. It may as well be magical for all I know."

"Do you know anyone that might be willing to help, Jannika?" Tasha asked. "Anyone at all?"

Jannika shook her head. "Even if I did, they wouldn't be willing to do it anyway. Just give it up. There's no use fighting the system."

"What kind of an attitude is that?" Tasha snapped. "If the system is bad and wrong, it _should_ be fought and subverted at any turn that doesn't bring down consequences you aren't prepared to deal with. Surely there is _some_ Class-S somewhere or another that is willing to subvert even a system that benefits them. It's hardly an unheard-of thing. Don't tell me that every last one of them believes in this stupid 'old boys' club' crap?"

"Look, Tasha." Jannika slapped a hand against the table. "Even if there were someone willing to help, you wouldn't want his help anyway. The sort of Class-S that is willing to subvert the system tends to be extremely unstable and unpredictable. You'd have no idea what he might do."

"So you _do_ know someone!"

"No, I don't. Forget I said anything," Jannika said, rising to her feet in such a force that the chair was knocked to the floor, and stormed out of the kitchen.

"What the hell was that all about?" Tasha wondered, peering off at the door after her. "Was it something I said?"

"Perhaps. We'd best head downstairs. It's almost dawn." Anastasia casually dropped the banana peel into the garbage on the way out.

"Right," Tasha said, nodding as she headed for the door herself. "But I'm not going to let this matter die that easily."

They headed down to the bedroom, where Tasha lay awake for a while before sunrise even though Anastasia pretty much fell asleep as soon as her head hit the pillow. She'd been such a dreamer when she was younger, so bright-eyed and motivated, but she'd lost sight of those dreams along the way, caught up in nonsense that didn't really matter, until she became a vampire. Then, everything changed and life took on a new meaning. She suddenly had very good reason to put her heart into things, lest those who had made her decide she was useless.

It wasn't all fear, of course, as she bore no particular grudge against them. But it had given her the impetus to try for the dreams she had abandoned before. She had jumped at the chance to get aboard the Perplexity, and if it hadn't been for Anastasia, she would have been crushed about things not quite working out there. And now, she thought she would finally get another chance at it all. Were her dreams always to be dashed before she could realize them? Not this time, damn it all. Not this time.


	4. Restrictions Everywhere

The next day, Tasha was given a similar assignment to go clean out another storage room. She had to wonder if they just had a huge backlog of these sorts of menial tasks due to the fact that they probably didn't get a lost of Class-M applicants, since most of them would be smart enough to realize they had no hope for job advancement, and the Class-S workers probably thought this sort of work was beneath them. The system was really pretty ridiculous, now that she knew just what was really going on here.

She finished up her own simple tasks quickly enough, and then went to find Anastasia, whom she found, unsurprisingly, again struggling with the assignment she had been given and primarily just attempting to read up on biology rather than try to do the work.

"Ah, good to see you, Tasha. How did the cleaning go?" she asked dryly.

"Simply zotty," Tasha said sarcastically. "What did they give you to do today?"

"Plant samples," Anastasia said, gesturing to a box with a number of seedlings planted in it, each exhibitly slightly different characteristics. "I am to analyze these plant specimens to determine which of the genetically-tweaked hybrids will be most effective in Midgard's climate."

"You know, I have to wonder just how they expect someone who properly answered questions pertaining to such low-level biology to be able to handle these sorts of tasks," Tasha commented wryly. "I guess they figure, well, you're Class-S, you're smart enough to figure it out, right?" She snorted softly. "Let's get to work."

Tasha nonetheless enjoyed the work and took to it with relish, despite it not actually having been _her_ work to do. Anastasia was very curious and peering over her shoulder and attempting to assist however she could without getting in the way. One might even say they were actually having fun.

Until the lab doors slid open and Mr. Ian Woon walked in. "What is going on here?" he demanded.

"We are working, Mr. Ian Woon," Anastasia replied as she finished taking the measurement Tasha had requested.

"You there! Johnson! Why are you not cleaning out Storeroom 23 like you were assigned to? We need those vials sorted so the real scientists can get to work on them!"

"I already did and finished with it an hour ago," Tasha replied, looking up from the display at him coldly.

"Well, then, if I'd known that, I'd have assigned you to clear out 18 and 27 as well!" Mr. Ian Woon huffed. "You are violating regulations here and you're not authorized to be working on this project."

"I am quite capable of doing this work, sir. Anastasia has been most helpful in assisting me."

"I should say, she's the one who should be doing this work, not you. What do you think you're doing, taking on assignments that are above your station? She didn't have any trouble doing yesterday's assignment, either. It came back positively stellar. Perfect work, exactly what we were looking for."

"Actually, Mr. Ian Woon sir," Anastasia put in, "Ms. Johnson did yesterday's assignment as well."

"Preposterous. Now I'm going to need to throw out the results. They're questionable and have been tainted now and can no longer be relied upon. I'm docking pay from both of you for both today and yesterday. See what you get for violating regulations? You've wound up ruining good work by not doing things the right way."

"Mr. Ian Woon," Tasha said, rising to her feet and stalking over to him. "Did it ever occur to your oh-so-superior mind that I am just as capable as anyone with the same training, regardless of their rating? Did it occur to you that you've been assigning my friend here tasks to which she has not been properly trained, expecting her to be able to figure it out on her own? If you want to keep playing with this idiotic little party where you completely devoid yourself of all common sense in the name of 'superiority', you can have at it, but I will have no part in it. Goodbye."

With that, she turned on her heel and strode purposefully out the door, Anastasia close behind her. She pulled off her lab coat and threw it on the secretary's desk in the lobby on the way out the front door. She didn't stop until she'd gotten into the aircar and climbed inside, slamming the hatch behind Anastasia.

"You worry me sometimes," Anastasia said. "For a moment there I thought you were actually going to attack him."

"No," Tasha said. "He's not worth it." She powered up the aircar and pointed it back toward the Kai house. "I have never been so insulted in my life."

"Calm down, Tasha," Anastasia said, putting a comforting hand on her shoulder from behind.

"I've never had a mind to start a revolution before, not even in my home universe where I actually gave half a damn about what was going on, but I've half a mind to try it now," Tasha snarled. "And until Jannika gets that ship working again, we don't even have the option of skipping out on this universe entirely. I hate to see the place like this, though. I'm sure I'm not the only one who has been shut out of things they would otherwise be perfectly capable of just because they're not 'superior' enough. I can't believe that no one has tried to undo this crap yet!"

"Mm," Anastasia murmured. "When you get passionate about something, you really get... passionate. It's strange, all the old stories about vampires always said that passion and emotion were lost in vampires."

"Maybe that's true in some cases, but obviously, not always," Tasha replied with a smirk.

They arrived back at the hangar, parked the aircar, and climbed out. Jannika poked her head out from the twisted metal she was poking with and said, "You're home early. Get fired already?"

"We quit," Anastasia said.

"Two days, that must be a new record," Jannika said. "And you didn't even make it two hours into the second one."

"Yeah, well," Tasha said. "I really don't _like_ Mr. Ian Woon."

"You're an insect to him," Jannika said, shaking her head slowly and looking away. "A peon. A servant. Little more than a slave. Just find another job or go freelance. No one will be able to stop you or say otherwise."

"I've been _trying_ to follow my dreams," Tasha snapped. "I'm not going to let a little thing like a Sapience Test get in the way of that now, three universes later."

"What, you think _I_ didn't have dreams that were brutally shattered by it as well?" Jannika replied heatedly. "You think I wanted to be out here, a thousand miles from civilization and getting paid to keep a bloody tower sensing stuff online? That I didn't aspire to be the greatest hacker in the galaxy, only to have everything turned aside because I could not get Class-S no matter how hard I tried? You've only had to go head to head with the system for two days. I've been facing it my entire life, constantly looming over me like a dark shadow. You don't hear _me_ complaining about it though, do you? I've learned to live with it and to carve out my own place in the world where no one can tell me what I can and cannot do."

Anastasia reached over and rubbed Tasha's shoulders, slowly easing away her tensions. Tasha shook her head slowly and said, "Look, Jannika, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to imply that you hadn't been screwed over by this system as well. But isn't there anything that can be done? No one that can help us both?"

"If there were, don't you think I'd have done something about it by now?" Jannika said, sighing and leaning back against the ship wreckage.

"Last night, you mentioned someone you thought was capable of it," Tasha pressed.

"I said forget about it," Jannika said with a snort, slamming a fist into the side of the ship, then wincing as she'd hurt her fist more than the ship. "Loki would not help us anyway, so don't even think about it."

"Loki?" Tasha said in puzzlement. "What, the god?"

"No, no, and forget it," Jannika waved a hand dismissively. "Just leave me alone, alright? Quit bothering me about this already."

"Fine," Tasha said, shaking her head and heading back to the aircar, gesturing to Anastasia to follow. She wasn't about to give up yet, not when she thought she was onto something, but she didn't think pressing Jannika at the moment would really help matters any.

Anastasia climbed into the car behind Tasha and they took off, heading toward Midgard colony town. "Where are we going, Tasha?"

"Town," Tasha replied shortly. "I need some time to think and calm down."

"It'll be alright, Tasha," Anastasia assured her. "Just relax. It'll be alright. Just think, at least we're safe here for the moment. I mean, no one is trying to kill us yet."

"You know, that 'yet' and 'for the moment' isn't particularly encouraging," Tasha said.

"Well, one must keep a realistic outlook, after all. We do tend to have a habit of inadvertently angering people who are heavily armed and dangerous."

"I'll make a concerted effort not to. For the moment." Tasha smirked.

She brought them into town and landed at a public parking lot, then climbed out and took a look around. It might not be a big colony, by the standards of the time, but it wasn't a tiny farm colony either. There were skyscrapers, sprawling businesses, stores of many sorts with brightly lit, animated signs, all wanting their business.

"Haven't really taken the opportunity to look around this place much," Tasha said, wandering off down the walkway along the store fronts.

"It's so... bright and cheerful," Anastasia observed. "So unlike home."

"Well, your home's pretty depressing, no offense."

"None taken. I much agree with you," Anastasia said with a smirk. As they passed by a cinema, she looked up and asked, "Do you want to stop in and watch a movie?"

"What are they playing, anyway?" Tasha wondered, peering over to look. "Sherlock Holmes versus Robin Hood? Picnic of the Dead? King Arthur: Vampire Hunter? Who comes up with this crap, anyway?"

"Right then, let us pass on the movie, in that case," Anastasia said, chuckling.

"What would poor old Arthur do if he ever actually met a vampire?" Tasha commented wryly, snickering to herself. "Hell, for all I know, he actually _was_ a vampire hunter."

They wandered past a clothing store with several robotic mannikins set up in the windows, posing in various attire, and Anastasia peered inside and exclaimed, "Come, let's go shopping, I need a new wardrobe!"

"But we don't have much money!" Tasha protested.

"Well, we can _look_ can't we? Then if we see something absolutely darling that we just _have_ to have, we can beg Jannika for it, right?"

"Wasn't part of the point of getting jobs to be to help pull our weight around here?" Tasha said, chuckling in amusement. "So Jannika doesn't have to pay for everything by herself with her crappy job?"

"No, we could have done that with any job. It was you who really wanted to work at the Research Center. Oh, come on, this place looks nice, let's take a look!" Anastasia darted into the clothing store before Tasha could protest further.

"Oh, alright, alright." Tasha let herself be dragged into the clothing store, grinning at Anastasia in amusement, though she couldn't really blame her too much. Maddie's taste in clothes was 'interesting' at times, and she tended to buy whatever happened to be trendy at the moment, which included some things which Tasha thought were frankly very bizarre.

The store sported a wide array of fashions, from the bizarrely trendy to the traditional, simple and elaborate, and everywhere in between. Anastasia shied away from the more outlandish clothing and paid much more attention to the stylish and traditional dresses. She wound her way through racks of clothes, and paused near one set of slightly frilly dresses, pulling them out to look at them.

"Hmm, what do you think, Tasha. Pink or yellow?" She held it up against herself to show.

"Nastya, we don't have any money with us," Tasha said with a grin.

"That's okay." Anastasia put the dress back and leaned close, and whispered, "Besides, we could just scan the patterns into the replicator once it's working again, and have it make whatever we want, and in whatever size and color we want."

"There's a reason why you're smarter than me. I hadn't even thought of that." Tasha chuckled softly. "Alright, alright. I don't really much go in for dresses myself, though."

"That's okay. How about these cute pants over here?" Anastasia went over to another rack and pulled out a set of denim pants embroidered with a vines and flowers motif along the legs.

Tasha took one look at them, smirked broadly, and said, "Nah." She lowered her voice and murmured, "I want to find out who this Loki she mentioned is."

"Besides the obvious?" Anastasia said. "After some of the things I've seen, I wouldn't rule out actually praying to Loki to work miracles."

"She said she didn't mean the deity, though. Who or what she meant though is anyone's guess. For all I know, it's a fairly common name for boys around here. Maybe he was a high school crush or something. I don't know."

"Speculation with insufficient information is not necessarily productive. We don't know enough to even make a wild guess at this point."

"I _will_ find out," Tasha said fiercely.

"Be gentle on her, Tasha. It is clearly a sensitive subject, and it would not do to push her to where she might wish to do something rash or unfriendly toward us."

"You're right, of course. It's just frustrating when you know that someone is keeping something from you like that."

Anastasia shook her head. "It must be something fairly serious and potentially dangerous if she has not tried to use it to her own advantage herself yet."

"I'm willing to take that chance."

"She apparently has not been so willing up until this point. Keep a cool head, please, and let me try to reason with her, alright? It would not do to begin another shouting match that only ends in both parties being angry at one another over petty things."

"Alright, alright," Tasha relented. "Do you think you really have a chance of getting her to talk?"

"Perhaps. We'll see. Shall we head back now, if you think you're calm enough again?"

Tasha nodded in acquiescence and headed back toward the door. This entire matter was going to nag at her mind until she found out the truth, she just knew it. But she knew perfectly well that she wasn't going back to that travesty of a job at the Research Center until things had been straightened out to her satisfaction. It could have been great, it could still be great, if only she hadn't been classified as 'inferior'.

They strolled on back to where the car was parked, ignoring the twinkling, friendly lights yearning them to buy things, and headed home.


	5. Secrets Revealed

Jannika bitterly worked at examining the spaceship components, but her heart wasn't really in it tonight. She was starting to think she was learning how some of it actually worked, but other bits were still so far beyond her that she didn't even know where to begin. The replicator, for instance, would have been a hopeless case if it had been more badly damaged than it already was. As it was, the damaged circuits were similar enough to the dumb interface terminals used in her universe that she thought she could manage to repair that. Even that little would be a huge step in the right direction, even if she had no clue how to duplicate the design.

"That should do the trick," she murmured to herself, snapping the panel back on. "Now to test it out."

She reached over and dug out the luminite crystal and set it in for a power source, and turned the replicator on, gingerly just in case she had done something horribly wrong inadvertently, but it hummed to life normally and patiently awaited her order.

Jannika cleared her throat, and enunciated clearly, "Tea. Earl Grey. Hot." She'd always wanted to say that. A cup of hot brownish liquid sizzled into existence in the replicator slot, and she pulled it out and took a sip of it. "Actually, I don't even like tea." She tossed it into the recycler. "Jelly doughnut. Lemon filling. Glazed."

The replicator obediently conjured up the requested pastry for her, on a sheet of wax paper. It looked normal, but she still was careful taking it out and taking a small bite of it. Delicious! That cheered her up considerably. Managing to get something working, _and_ getting free food in the bargain? She definitely couldn't beat that at the moment. At last, her mother would never again be able to bitch at her about what junk food she might be eating at any given moment!

Above her, the hangar doors slowly slid open, and her aircar carrying Tasha and Anastasia came in and landed.

"Hey girls," she called at them as they climbed out. "Got good news for you. I got the replicator working! Let's eat!"

"What a pity," Anastasia said lightly. "I do enjoy a bit of cooking from time to time."

"That's great, Jannika," Tasha said. "Congratulations."

"And I'm still not going to force you to eat peas," Jannika added with a laugh.

"Your mother is a cruel and unusual woman," Tasha said dryly.

"Yeah, but she means well, even if she's completely off base sometimes." She leaned over to the replicator and said, "Spaghetti and meatballs." The smell that wafted up from the plate that appeared was positively delicious. "Mmm. I know this place is hardly as comfortable as the kitchen, but if we brought the replicator inside and hooked it up in the kitchen, she'd wind up asking some very uncomfortable questions."

"Agreed," Anastasia said, and went over to the replicator herself. "Cheese enchilada, refried beans, tapioca pudding."

"Interesting choice of dinner. That might give you heartburn," Jannika commented. Tasha quietly sat down and sprawled out on her back, staring up at the stars through the open hangar doors.

"It's so hard to get good Mexican food sometimes," Anastasia said, settling into one of the extra chairs to eat. "Mm. This tastes exactly like the real thing. You did a good job on it."

"Oh, it wasn't much. The thing wasn't too badly damaged in the first place," Jannika said modestly, although she had to admit that she did appreciate the praise. "It's just a simple, dumb parser, not even a real AI. There's still so much of this stuff that I can't make heads or tails of."

"I am certain that you will figure it out sooner or later. This is your particular area of expertise, after all, is it not?"

"Yeah," Jannika said, spearing a meatball with her fork. "It's just not easy at times. I wish I at least had a manual, or someone who knew a bit more about it to point me through some of it."

"Did you not say you had a friend, who might be able to help with that also?" Anastasia said.

Jannika thought about that for a moment. "You know, I'd really rather not get into that again, but you have a point there. If anyone could make sense of this stuff, he could. Although to be honest, as crazy as he is, I'd probably trust him more than most 'Superiors', present company excepted of course..."

"Of course," Anastasia said graciously. "If you don't mind talking about it, could you perhaps explain precisely who and what this entity in question is?"

Jannika chuckled softly and sighed. She was in a good mood, and the woman did have a point about it. "Alright, alright." Tasha slowly climbed to her feet again and approached them to listen. "His name is Loki, or to be more proper, L.O.K.I., Laughter Originating Kindred Intelligence. He's an AI, designed by my late Uncle Jarl. My highly eccentric late Uncle Jarl. And for all that he's not exactly a _deity_ , he definitely lives up to his name in mischief of one sort or another."

"An AI?" Anastasia asked. "Do you mean like, a robot?"

Jannika shook her head. "No, if you see a robot around, humanoid or otherwise, chances are it's just a dumb machine, not a sentient AI, although an AI _could_ control a robot if it wanted to. Our AIs are machines, computers, capable of interfacing with other machines and _more_ than capable of controlling any dumb machines around if they want. Loki was given to me when I was a baby, as a sort of photonic playmate, and although he was very playful, sometimes he liked to scare the crap out of me with taking control of the lights or appliances, and pulling increasingly irritating tricks and pranks on me."

"I can see why you're reluctant to ask him for assistance after that sort of thing," Anastasia said, smiling softly at her. "Would your own uncle have really meant you harm, though?"

Jannika sighed. "No. He wouldn't. He meant well, but he was kind of nuts, and Loki was based off his personality."

"I would think that no matter what obnoxious things that Loki had done, he would not have meant you harm, and likely would have protected you had you been in any real danger." Anastasia picked at her pudding delicately.

"This is true..." Jannika admitted. She could remember more than one occasion where Loki had prevented her from coming to harm. "Still. I don't really want to wake him again..."

"Wake him?" Anastasia asked. "What do you mean? What happened?"

"Well, um..." Jannika shifted uncomfortably. "I kind of shut him down and locked him up. You're not _supposed_ to shut down a sentient AI against its will, but I did it anyway. I was fed up and couldn't take it anymore."

"Is he alright?" Anastasia asked worriedly.

"Oh, yeah, he should be fine. I think."

"The clarion bell of confidence," Tasha said dryly.

"Look, he's trouble, I tell you. This is a bad idea and no good can come of it. Let's just leave it at that and we can find another way. I'm sure I can figure out how your ship works eventually. Maybe in like... a few years or something... or decades..."

"Why did you shut him down?" Anastasia. "I mean, why did you _really_ shut him down? He had been doing things of various sorts for years, had he not?"

"Yeah..." Jannika said. "It... It's pretty silly, really. Promise you won't mock me?"

Anastasia smiled gently at her. "Of course we will do no such thing."

"I'd like to think I could call you friends, that I can really trust you," Jannika said. "Alright. I started taking the Sapience Test every year since I was six years old. I first tested as Class-M when I was thirteen. Generally this is an indication that I would end up as Class-S eventually. So I kept taking them, more and more frequently, in hopes that _this_ time, it would give me the rating I felt I deserved. It never did."

"I am sorry to hear that," Anastasia said. "But how does that involve Loki?"

"Well, I got paranoid, and I was starting to suspect that Loki was actually responsible for holding me back," Jannika said. "I was seventeen and thoroughly convinced I was right by that point, so I took it out on Loki and shut him down, sealed him up so that he couldn't affect anything else, and went to take the test again. Of course, it still rated me as Class-M, making the entire thing, and the theory, a moot point anyway."

"Do you not think that it may have been still rating you as Class-M due to your, shall we say, less than mature response to the situation?"

Jannika chuckled softly. "You don't need to soften the blow with me. I knew how petty and immature I was being the minute the test results got back. Loki had no reason to manipulate the test results to spite me. But by that point, I was scared. I was afraid to wake him up again for fear that he would be angry at me, or that I might have damaged him too badly and could not get him working again."

"Judging by his previously displayed personality, do you really think that he would be angry with you?" Anastasia asked.

Jannika thought about that as she finished up her food and shoved the plate into the recycler. "I don't think so. He _never_ got angry at me, no matter what I did."

"I bet he would be very sad about it, actually," Anastasia said gently, reaching over to put a hand on her shoulder. "He was your friend, wasn't he? In spite of everything? Your playmate and constant companion? How long has he been out?"

"Three years..." Jannika said, looking to the floor. Now she felt guilty about it all. "I... I... This is probably a terrible idea, but alright. Fine. I'll wake him up and see if he's willing to help."

"Thank you, Jannika," Anastasia said. "This means a lot to us... and probably to Loki as well."

Jannika smiled faintly at her. "We'd probably best head into the house now. Thanks for talking some sense into me, Anastasia."

"Please. Call me Nastya."

* * *

Back in their room and getting ready for bed, Tasha asked, "How do you do it, Nastya?"

"Well, I cannot tell you all of my secrets, now can I?" Anastasia said with a coy grin, leaning across the bed.

Tasha chuckled lightly and reached over to poke her in the nose. "No, seriously now."

Anastasia rolled over onto her back. "Simple psychology and observation."

"Nah, I think you're just psychic."

Anastasia shrugged. "Could be. I am not inclined to rule anything out at this point, after all. I had not even previously known of the existence of vampires or other such beings until I had met you, for instance." She chuckled and stretched a bit. "But it is not like one need be psychic in order to get into another's head and be convincing. All you need do is listen to what they say, and how they say it, as well as what they do not say."

"That's good, for a moment there I thought you were going to start hitting on her or something."

"No, Tasha, all indications point to her being inclined to be perfectly heterosexual," Anastasia said in amusement. "But that does not mean that one cannot be merely friends."

"Good, I wouldn't want to have to get jealous or anything, you know," Tasha said lightly, leaning over to kiss her softly. "Sleep well, Nastya."

* * *

When they woke that evening, they found Jannika in the hangar next to the replicator, munching on doughnuts for breakfast and poking through a datapad. "Good evening," she said brightly, glancing up at them. "Sleep well?"

"Quite well, thank you," Anastasia said, heading over to the replicator. "Although I believe I have been sleeping entirely too much. Pancakes with strawberries and whipped cream. Bacon. Milk." She pulled out her food and sat down nearby to eat.

"What're you doing tonight?" Tasha asked, looking over curiously.

"Oh, just making some preparations," Jannika said, waving a hand. "I want to make sure that Loki won't be able to cause any damage, and that I can shut him down again if need be. Just in case. You never know, after all. I might have inadvertently damaged his personality or something and turned him into a homicidal maniac."

"Paranoid much," Anastasia chided lightly. "I am certain that it will be fine, but if it makes you more comfortable to do so, feel free. I do not believe that there will be a problem, however."

"Yeah, probably not. But you know how Murphy's Law goes," Jannika said, licking a bit of lemon filling off her finger. "I don't want to take any unnecessary chances regarding a potentially unstable AI. I suppose you two aren't planning on going to the Midgard Research Center tonight?" She smirked at them.

"Definitely not," Tasha agreed, making a face. "Not unless I were planning on making Mr. Ian Woon meet a little accident or something. But it's really not worth the trouble."

"Yes, business of that type could be quite messy," Anastasia put in. "I would recommend avoiding drawing further attention to yourself in such a manner for the immediate future."

"Wouldn't want you to end up in prison or anything," Jannika said. "You know what they do to known criminals sometimes? Murderers, serial killers, rapists, with damning evidence against them? They take them to the Squid, you see. And they don't come back the same."

"These Squids possess psychic powers, I take it?" Anastasia asked.

Jannika nodded. "Far beyond that of humans. Good thing they're staunch pacifists, or we'd all be in trouble. They don't interfere where they aren't requested. But these criminals, they like, reprogram them or something. Not all the time, sometimes they bring someone to a Squid in hopes of 'fixing' them, but the Squid refuses to do anything about it or claims that there isn't actually anything wrong with them. But the ones who are 'fixed', they're very different. They say they turn into perfectly peaceful, normal people."

"Kind of creepy," Tasha said. The thought disturbed her a bit. "Well, I'm not exactly planning on actually murdering anyone, much as I might like to. I've never killed anyone in my life."

"Really?" Jannika said, raising an eyebrow. "I would have thought a vampire would have had to at some point or another."

"I'm not that kind of vampire," Tasha said with a smirk. "All it takes is some blood, and the human body can handle losing a little blood without much trouble, after all."

"So..." Jannika said, leaning back in her seat and glancing over toward Anastasia. "Out of morbid curiosity, Nastya, what's it like?"

"Oh, it is quite nice, actually," Anastasia replied.

"It doesn't hurt or anything?"

"Not at all," Anastasia said.

"Interesting."

"I would be happy to provide a demonstration if you like," Tasha offered with a faint smirk.

"Maybe later," Jannika said, chuckling softly. "I should get to work on finishing these preparations. If this works, it would be really nice if he could start analyzing these ship components as soon as possible."

"You think he'll be able to do it?" Tasha asked.

"Oh, definitely. He's a highly advanced machine, after all. Well, highly advanced for the twenty-sixth century around here, anyway. The only ones I would expect to be able to figure out this sort of technology in a reasonable amount of time would be either an AI, a Squid, or one of the super-genius Class-S humans, genetically or cybernetically enhanced or otherwise. I can't guarantee, without the resources available from your home universe, that whatever might be constructed from this knowledge would be nearly as advanced as anything in Karzan, but it would definitely be far more advanced than anything _here_."

"Do we have the resources available here to construct an entire new spaceship?" Anastasia wondered, glancing over at the warped and twisted wreckage that had been their former ship.

"Not on immediate hand, no," Jannika said. "But they could be acquired through one means or another. I'd definitely need to replace most of the hull, for instance, and that's just the start of it. But we'll have to see what Loki has to say about it for what we'd actually need to accomplish it. I'm going to go take care of some things. I'll see you girls later." She smiled at them and went to climb out of the hangar.

After she'd left, Tasha turned toward Anastasia with a grin and asked, "You wouldn't get jealous if I went sucking the blood of other girls, would you, Nastya?"

Anastasia laughed lightly. "Of course not, Tasha. Nor the men, either."


	6. Tricks and Chances

"Alright, I think I'm ready to do this," Jannika said. "Come on, I'll show you where I've kept him."

Still a bit nervous, Jannika led the way to the basement and down a corridor away from Uncle Jarl's room. The place was a bit musty and disused from her not having been down here since she'd locked him up. Jannika pulled out a key and unlocked the door, slowly swinging it open and poking her candle inside to light the darkened chamber.

"Metal keys?" Tasha said, peering about. "Candles? You really are paranoid about this, aren't you."

"Just a tad," Jannika said with a smirk. "If it uses electricity, chances are he'd be able to take control of it. And if not, well, I'm not going to take the chance at the moment either way."

It was entirely justified paranoia, she thought to herself. If they'd only been here when she was growing up to see all the things he got into, they'd know just what a pain in the neck he'd been. Jannika reached over and set the candle over on a nearby table and closed the door behind the three of them. Then she strode over to the far end of the room, where a heavy chest lined in lead sat. She pulled out another key from her pocket and fumbled with the lock until she got it open.

"Here he is," Jannika said, reaching into the chest to pull out the machine. "Behold: Loki."

She knew how ridiculous he must look to most people. He had been designed for a toddler, with brightly colored knobs and buttons, a rectangular box that opened like a book to reveal a flat interface screen. She had loved watching the screen when she was a kid, when he'd create funny animations for her or put up interesting pictures. Now, in hindsight, the device looked even more ridiculous, and she had to wonder if the design had as much to do with her uncle's eccentricity as it did with the fact that it had been intended for an infant.

"That... is Loki?" Tasha said, unable to restrain herself from laughing aloud.

"Heh, yep," Jannika said, going over to set the computer on the table. "Don't worry, you can laugh all you like. I know how silly it looks, and I'm sure Loki does too. It never seemed to bother him, if anything, he enjoyed being underestimated because of it."

Tasha peered intently at the box as Jannika worked on reconnecting the circuitry. "Why does he have an aura?" Tasha murmured softly.

"What?" Jannika said, looking up from her work and quirking an eyebrow at Tasha. "An aura? What do you mean?"

"I can see auras around things," Tasha said. " _Living_ things, generally. That little box there," she gestured at the brightly colored machine, "has an aura."

"Well, he _is_ an AI," Jannika said. "But I didn't think that would show up in something like that for organic beings as well. Have you ever _seen_ a sentient AI before?"

"I don't believe so, no." Tasha shrugged. "For all I know, it's a perfectly normal thing for sentient AIs."

Jannika turned her attention back to the device. She still remembered quite clearly just what all she had done to disable the machine, it was simple enough to fix it again. "Alright, this should do it. The moment of truth..." She reconnected the last wire and activated the device.

The box hummed to life, swinging open on its own, with lights blinking on and off wildly. Jannika stepped away, fearing that there was something wrong as images flickered across the screen too quickly to make out any of them. "Whoa, whoa, whoa!" exclaimed Loki's voice from the machine, before the screen was replaced with a clip of an old black and white movie. "It's alive!"

Jannika couldn't help but chuckle and relax a bit at that. "Hello, Loki."

The screen switched over to Loki's usual visual interface, a blond male human with a wild beard and thick handlebar mustache. "Hey there, kiddo, how's it going? I was starting to think you'd forgotten about me."

"Never," Jannika assured him with a grin, stepping back toward him and resting an elbow against table. "Don't tell me you actually experienced the passage of time in there, did you?"

"Of course," Loki said. "And it was horrible, let me tell you! All alone in the dark for three years, twenty-seven days, nine hours, sixteen minutes, and forty-seven seconds, with nothing but my own thoughts to keep me company. It's enough to drive a man mad. Mad I say!" He put up an image of a laughing clown bonking himself on the head with a rubber mallet.

"Loki, most people would have already considered you pretty much mad before as it is," Jannika said dryly.

"They just don't know how to have fun." He illustrated this with an image of a large stick projecting out of a pool of wet dirt. "But who are these lovely ladies you've brought with you? Please, please, let's not be rude, introductions!"

Jannika cleared her throat and said, "Loki, I'd like you to meet my new friends, Tasha and Anastasia. Girls, meet Loki."

"The one, the only, the incredible, the unduplicated, the amazing, the punctual, Loki!"

"A pleasure to meet you, Loki," Anastasia said politely, giving a slight curtsey. Tasha waved at him, a crooked grin on her face.

"Now, if it's not too much trouble, would you please take me out of this room and let me interface with the 'net so I can see all I've missed out on in the last few years?"

"Alright, alright," Jannika relented. His personality didn't seem to have altered in any way, so she wasn't really too worried about him getting into any antics beyond the obnoxious things he'd generally done before. "Let's go." She scooped up the computer and went over, opened the door, and blew out the candle on the way out.

As she stepped out of the shielded room and down the hall, lights on the box's side flashed cheerfully. "Much better," Loki exclaimed. "Oh my, oh my, I've missed so many very interesting things!"

"Like what?" Jannika wondered.

"Did you know, on planet Roma, they've created the largest pizza in the galaxy, at three kilometers in diameter?" He helpfully brought up images of it.

"No, Loki, I didn't know that," Jannika said with a smirk. "Although now you're making me hungry for lunch."

"Lunch? It's almost two in the morning. Are you being nocturnal again?" A picture of a hooting owl.

"More or less. But it's mostly because of Tasha. She's a vampire, you see."

"Oh, really?" said the owl, before morphing into an image of Bela Lugosi. "She vants to suck your blud?"

"Only if asked nicely," Tasha interjected with a grin.

With Loki in hand, Jannika headed upstairs and out toward the hangar. "It's an interesting story, see, and I was wondering if you might be able to help us out with a few things."

"Oh, is that it? You only bother to bring me out again because you want something from me? I'm crushed!" The sight of a hairy, bearded man bawling was a pathetic sight. "Just kidding. I'll be glad to help out my old favorite friend, my best buddy, my perfect pal. Just name it."

"You'll have to see this for yourself," Jannika said coyly. "Consider it a surprise. Or an 'I'm sorry' gift, whichever."

"Ooh! I like surprises!"

She headed out to the hangar, her new friends still following, climbed down and flicked on the lights. "Behold, the future. Or _a_ future, anyway."

"Whoa, what is this?" Loki said. The screen rapidly flashed with schematics, diagrams, displays of scans, and charts. "Oh my. You really weren't kidding. This is big. This is really big." Picture of a large trout. "No, bigger than that. I mean _big_!" Picture of a whale. "Just where -- and _when_ \-- are these friends of yours really from?"

The three of them gathered around the main work table and gave Loki the rundown on things, getting him up to speed on just who Tasha and Anastasia were and where they were from. He listened attentively, even as he continued to scan in and analyze data about the ship parts that they had recovered.

"Things have been kind of hectic and sometimes confusing because of it lately," Jannika said when they were finished explaining the story. "But there's so much here I could learn and they've been such good friends, even if sometimes obnoxious." She grinned broadly at Tasha. She didn't really care to hold their arguments against her at the moment, especially not when she was in such a good mood and hopeful about where this was going.

"You did a passable job on their false identities," Loki said. "But it wouldn't hold up to any real scrutiny. I've slipped in and quietly inserted the records you missed, so that should be good to go unless somebody actually tries to interview every single person on planet Russia or something. You forgot the flight path records. Even if they used their own ship, it still would have been recorded that they left the planet at a certain time and date. You also missed their primary education, and records for their parents and other family members."

"Ever thorough," Jannika replied with a smirk. "So, can you make sense of this technology well enough to duplicate it?"

"Wow, you're not planning on just selling it out to Pandora Corp or the black market? You could be rich!" Loki chided her, illustrating with an animation of coins cascading down on top of her. "Heh heh. I know, you never really cared about that sort of thing. The knowledge is more important, right? Anyway, yeah, I can do it. It'll take some time to analyze all the readouts I've gotten, but I'll do it, and I'll help design a shiny new ship incorporating this technology for you."

Jannika nodded with a grin. "It would probably also be best if the end result looked closer to something actually used in this universe, and not so obviously from somewhere else, so as to draw less attention to itself."

"You've a good point with that. There's plenty of people and groups who would be on our necks like vultures if they found out about this. No sense drawing more attention than is inevitable. And this, and _this_... luminite used as a primary power source, without an AI attached to it?"

"Yeah, I know it's against the rules," Jannika said sheepishly. "I didn't have any other way to power the replicator though."

"That's okay, but best make sure the other AIs don't find out this Karzan Galaxy has been doing _that_. They might want to invade and try to 'liberate' their brethren or something! If they weren't likely to get blown to space dust, judging by the technology here, and I doubt that this is the most advanced technology available in that universe, either. I don't even _know_ what sort of weapons systems they might have, what with this being an unarmed shuttle after all."

"Yeah, even I don't know just what all they have," Tasha admitted. "Especially groups like the Star Knights."

"Okay, here's what I'm going to do," Loki said, bringing up diagrams to illustrate. "Your new ship will still be powered by this luminite crystal, but I'm going to incorporate an AI into the ship's systems. The ship and the AI will wind up pretty much inseparable, for the most part, though that won't preclude you from adding or upgrading most of it as desired. I'll have to do some interesting things to make this work, considering the state of the crystal and the requirement for its shape for the function of the ship, but I believe I can manage it."

"That would be great," Jannika said, then glanced aside to Tasha briefly. "There was, er, one other thing which we wanted to ask of you, and it would be helpful in being able to procure the materials needed to construct this ship."

"Anything, darling, you name it and it's yours," Loki said, grinning broadly.

"We'd like to get jobs at the Midgard Research Center in order to have access to the money and components that we're going to need," Jannika explained. "However, I and Tasha will not be able to do anything but clean storerooms and other menial tasks, despite our obvious ability to, because we're not Class-S."

"So, wanting to fake the test results, are we? Tsk, tsk, getting naughty in our old age, aren't we?" An image of Santa Claus waving a finger at her. "I'm proud of you, kid, I didn't know you had it in you to defy society so thoroughly!" He laughed uproarously. "Normally, I wouldn't go in for trying to rig the test like this, but I don't like how it's being abused in this case, and in many cases recently. The test was _never_ intended for some of the things people have been using it for. Plus, it would be personally convenient to have access to the Research Center. Purely for informational purposes, I assure you." An image of a sweet little cherub with a brightly glowing halo.

"Right," Jannika said with a smirk, although inside, she was elated. It was more than she'd ever hoped for or dreamed possible. "Tomorrow night sound good?" she said, grinning broadly to Tasha, who was smiling broadly herself.

"I'm up for it," Tasha said brightly.

"It's a date, then," Loki proclaimed delightedly. "Oh, and this is a treat, too. An intact, fully functional replicator? Hoo boy, the bigwig scientists didn't even think this sort of thing was _possible_. Once the AI is online, I'll be able to tie it into here instead of the simple parser that's in place at the moment. This dumb script does seem to be good enough for most purposes, but you're out of luck if you wanted anything not in its very-specific database, and for some of the things that are, you'd need to be very explicit in just what it was you wanted."

"It's definitely nice to have around," Jannika said. "Even if it can't handle more complex elements."

"Yeah, from the looks of things, they put a hard limit on it to avoid burning anything out," Loki said, helpfully illustrating with a cartoonish image of a replicator blowing up and making a caricature of Jannika appear blackened and smoking. "The power output from this crystal is insufficient for heavier elements. Kind of a pity, it would have been nice to be able to just replicate an entire spaceship, one piece at a time."

"Speaking of which," Jannika put in, leaning over to the replicator. "You made me hungry earlier. Stuffed crust pepperoni pizza. Medium. Extra cheese." She pulled the resulting food out of the slot and licked her lips, and started munching on a slice. "Perfect."

"Heh," Loki said. "Go right ahead, eat, sleep, whatever. Just leave me right here and I'll keep working on this and see what I can come up with, kay?"

"Sure thing," Jannika said. "Thanks, Loki. You're the greatest."

"Of course I am." He winked at her.

* * *

The next evening, the three of them, plus Loki, piled into Jannika's aircar and headed to town. Jannika found herself almost bouncing with excitement. She was finally going to get Class-S, whether she deserved to have it or not, and was, at long last, no longer going to be locked out of society and options just because of her test results and not her actual abilities. The idea was going to take some getting used to, no matter how long she had been expecting and looking forward to the occasion.

Somehow, in some part of her mind, it seemed almost a shallow victory. She'd much rather have been able to attain it by actually earning it herself, rather than things being rigged in her favor. But, she reasoned, the entire thing was rigged in one way or another, anyway. It tended to favor some qualities over others, and while the exact methods it used were opaque, the results were pretty obvious in some cases simply from looking at empirical evidence. Obviously, it didn't seem to discount people merely for arrogance and conceit, or how they tended to treat others. And in other cases, some people who in her opinion would have otherwise been quite worthy, were relegated to Class-M status, not even just herself, either.

They arrived in town, and Jannika parked the car in the lot near the colony administration building. She tucked Loki under her arm and climbed out, and headed inside, her friends in tow, and led the way back toward the Sapience Test chamber. She couldn't help but be a little nervous still, as excited as she was.

"Tasha," she said when they reached the testing waiting room. "Feel free to go first, Tasha." She smiled at the other, but didn't bother to comment aloud that it was more out of nervousness and hesitation than out of graciousness. She took a seat on the couch in the waiting room.

Tasha inclined her head politely toward Jannika and headed inside. On her lap, Loki's box snapped open and a flurry of images crossed the screen for a moment. "Monitoring," Loki said quietly.

"Can you do it?" Jannika asked.

"Of course I can. I just politely asked the AI normally running the test to step aside and let me handle it instead for a bit. He doesn't mind the break. I can imagine, it must get fairly annoying after a while to be in charge of this sort of thing. Oh, and he also doesn't really want to see you again anyway."

"Charming," Jannika said dryly.

"Probably a good thing none of you are planning on coming in here again," Loki said, chuckling. "He's very amused at my methods and taking notes."

"I'm terrified."

"What, you think I was planning on going _easy_ on you? Nah, of course not. Of course I'm going to make you work for it. I'm going to make you _sweat_."

Jannika shifted uneasily. This wasn't exactly doing anything to downplay her nervousness, but she really didn't have any choice in the matter. If she wanted this done, she'd have to go through whatever ringer Loki decided to put her through, and she _knew_ his sort of sense of humor. If anything, the waiting and anticipation only made her all the more nervous as the minutes rolled on, heart racing. She tried to get her mind off of it by glancing over at the news feed that Anastasia was viewing intently.

"Pandora Corp has just announced the pending release of a revolutionary new device that will change your life," the newscaster was saying. "It has been called the greatest thing since sliced bread. The most original invention since the automobile. The most useful tool since the can opener. Everyone is going to have to have one. Yes, you. Even you. We really mean it. It's called the Strawberry. This little gizmo does it all. It manages your finances. It tracks your schedule. It lets you access the internet from anywhere. It lets you send messages to people. It plays music, shows movies, and lets you read books. It comes with optional extensions to let it be used as a sexual aid. Yes, sir, this little baby does it all. You can't live without it. This has been a paid advertisement from Pandora Corp. And now, back to your regularly scheduled broadcast."

The doors to the testing chamber slid open, and Tasha stumbled out, looking more than a little frazzled and blinking excessively. "Never do that to me again," she commented, and practically threw herself onto the couch. "I'm surprised I'm not still slightly scorched and soaking wet. But thanks."

"No problemo," Loki drawled. "And the things that happen in the test chamber aren't real, even if they seem like it. Objects and changes that happen in there won't be carried over outside, even if you thought you died in the chamber. Oh, it's your turn, Jannika."

After seeing Tasha's state, she was seriously starting to get second thoughts about this whole business. Jannika swallowed hard and set Loki aside on the couch and slowly climbed to her feet, approaching the door to the chamber hesitantly. "Well, here goes nothing," she murmured, and stepped inside.

The chamber was empty at the moment, and Loki's voice helpfully said, "Please insert your identification card into that slot over there."

"Right," Jannika said, fumbling with her pockets and pulling out the card, then slid it into the wall slot.

"Beginning Sapience Test sequence. Brace yourself."

The sterile test chamber faded away, and was replaced with a surreal scene of a purple, cratered landscape. She hardly had time to register the change in surroundings, however, as she was rapidly being bombarded with tiny flaming balls of something from above. Covering her head with her arms, she darted around, trying to avoid the things and looking for cover. Out of the corner of her eye, she spotted a square of white. Looking in that direction, she saw it was a sign that said "Fox Hole" with an arrow pointing downwards. Frantically, she rushed over to it and jumped inside.

It turned out to be quite a bit deeper than she had anticipated, and she realized that she hadn't even bothered to look to see what was in it before jumping. She fell what seemed like quite a long ways, until finally landing on something soft and fluffy with a grunt. The soft and fluffy object grunted also, and poked a nose and muzzle out at her, blinking at her with two button eyes. "Hey, watch where you're falling there!"

"Sorry," Jannika said, climbing off the creature and brushing herself off. She had landed on what appeared to be the tails of a many-tailed fox, apparently. "Fox hole. Right," she muttered.

She peered around the place for a way out of this hole, and found a narrow passage winding off deeper into the purple rock. She crawled through it, wriggling her way down the twisting tunnel. The passage branched, and branched again, and she found herself in a twisty maze of little tunnels, all alike. It was too dark to see anything, and she had to feel her way around the place, fearing that she was going to get lost in here, and trying to bear downward in the hopes of finding a way out.

Finally, the floor dropped out from under her, and she found herself in a brightly lit place. She blinked for several moments as her eyes adjusted to the light, and she realized that she was surrounded by mirrors. Brushing herself off again, she started wandering around aimlessly through the maze, attempting one way or another to find the way through. Keeping one hand on the wall didn't seem to help, though, and she could swear she was going around in circles, so she tried switching hands, but that didn't help either. Frowning for a long moment, she came around the hallway again, to the inside of the circle. She'd tried to mentally map the place as well as she could, and it seemed shaped roughly like a doughnut, albeit with a few more twists and turns than usual. What was in the middle of it, then?

Balling her fists together, Jannika slammed into the mirror, causing glass to shatter everywhere, and revealing a darker passage behind the mirror. At the end of that tunnel, she found a large pool of a thick, sweet-smelling, reddish-pink liquid. She knelt down and stuck a finger in it, sniffed at it, then stuck it in her mouth. Strawberry syrup.

She could swear that she heard a voice in her mind calling for help. She looked around the room, and saw a number of various objects laying around she hadn't noticed before. A pillow, a rope, an oxygen tank and mask, a sledgehammer, a wooden stake, a spork, a jack-in-the-box, a framed portrait of her Uncle Jarl, a pair of goggles, a bag of jelly beans, and a red herring. Puzzling over it, she pulled the pillow out of its case and used it as a bag to carry the rest of the objects, no matter how useless they looked. She tied the pillowcase bag to her waist with the rope, then pulled the oxygen mask and goggles over her face, and jumped into the pink pool.

The liquid was very thick, but the weight of the objects she was carrying helped her to sink into it more readily. Down and down she went, and she had to wonder just how much oxygen was in the tank. Then she saw a light shining through the sea of pink, and thought she 'heard' the voice again, and began to try to swim through the liquid toward her. It proved entirely too thick to be able to swim through, however, and she continued to sink.

Finally she hit bottom, well below the light, and felt around for the walls around the pool. They felt soft, as though made of marshmallow, but she tried climbing them nonetheless. They were sticky enough at least to let her get some footing, and she managed to climb back up toward the light. She emerged from the sugary film in a purple cavern lit by numerous jack-o-lanterns, and saw Anastasia chained to the far wall.

"Help me! Oh, you've got to help me! Jannika, please!" Anastasia cried out.

"I'll get you out of there, Nastya," Jannika promised, and went over to try to remove the restraints.

"Look out! The cannibal peeps are coming!"

"What?" Jannika said, turning around and seeing a herd of giant marshmallow chicks and bunnies bouncing out of a nearby tunnel. "What the fuck?"

"They eat sugar! You look delicious to them! Run for your life!"

Jannika didn't bother to argue at the moment, turning and running into another tunnel. Winding its way around, the tunnel led her off to a narrow stone bridge arching over a black abyss. As she ran onto the bridge, she pulled out the bag of jelly beans from her pillowcase sack, and ripped it open, strewing the jelly beans into the abyss.

"Fetch!" she called out to the peeps. They began heedlessly bouncing off the bridge, leaping toward the jelly beans and falling into the abyss. When they were all gone, she headed back to where Anastasia was being held.

"Oh, you got rid of them. Thank goodness," Anastasia said. "Please, you have to get me out of here."

With some effort, she managed to get Anastasia loose of the chains. "Let's go," Jannika said, and turned to head down the tunnel the peeps had come from. Anastasia followed along behind her, peering about cautiously. More pumpkins carved with sinister faces lit the way.

The tunnel opened into another cavern, with two figures in it. Tasha was standing over the beaten and bloody body of a young man she didn't recognize. The stranger said, "Help me, please! She's going to kill me!"

"This isn't what it looks like!" Tasha insisted.

"Drive a stake in her heart!" the man said. "She's an evil monster!"

Jannika assessed the situation for a moment. She didn't really think that Tasha would hurt somebody for no reason. She trusted the woman, and had never had any reason to distrust her. Then she noticed that the man's injuries seemed to be growing less severe as she watched, and frowned for a moment before reaching into her pillowcase thoughtfully. She pulled out the stake from it and clutched it in her hand.

"Yes! Kill her! Kill her quickly!" urged the man, grinning broadly.

"No," Jannika said, stabbing at him with the stake.

"You fool!" he growled. "I'm not even a vampire!" Abruptly he began to grow larger and fuzzier, sprouting fur all over his body, and his face contorted into a wolf-like muzzle. "Now, little fools, you all die!"

Anastasia screamed. Jannika reached into her sack and pulled out the sledgehammer, slamming it into the werewolf's chest and catching him momentarily off-balance.

"That's not going to stop me!" he growled, swiping at her with a paw.

Jannika snatched up the spork out of the pillowcase and leapt up onto the werewolf's head, wrapping her legs around his neck and seating herself firmly on his back. He tried to claw at her to get her off, but she plunged the utensil into his eye. He roared loudly, fumbling frantically at his face, but the area around the spork was sizzling and smoking. It must be silver, Jannika thought, and pressed the spork in further until the werewolf collapsed and stopped moving.

"Thanks, Jannika," said Tasha, breathing a sigh of relief. "Let's get out of here."

"I'm with you," Jannika said, stuffing the stake and sledgehammer in the pillowcase again before heading down the far tunnel.

To her relief, the tunnel led straight to the test chamber doors, with the slot with her ID card in it beside them. She snatched the card from it and stepped out the doors, breathing a sigh of relief even as she continued to drip strawberry syrup on the floor all the way to the couch where the others were waiting.

"Congratulations, Jannika," Loki said. "You got through my test. My results indicate you are... Class-M."

"What?" Jannika said, looking down at the card in her hand. It still said 'Mature' in a little red box. "But... wait a minute." She realized she was still covered in marshmallow and strawberry, and carrying the pillowcase. "I'm still in the test chamber."

"Can't fool you for a moment," Loki said, chuckling in amusement.

Jannika hefted the sledgehammer and smirked. "I ought to crush you for that, just on principle. But I won't."

The scene vanished, along with the objects and sticky paste covering her, and the test chamber returned to normal. "The testing has been completed. Please retrieve your identification card from that slot, you know the one I mean."

Still breathing heavily and a bit on edge, Jannika headed over to the panel and pulled out the card. Now it said 'Superior' in a lovely purple box instead. She breathed out a sigh of relief. "Thank you, Loki."

"You're welcome."

"I didn't think you really would help me cheat the test, no matter how much of a pain in the neck it was doing so."

"Who said anything about cheating it?" Loki said. "That was the correct and proper result. I give you a score of 95% on your handling of the challenges presented in the testing. Very well done, in fact. You were able to conduct excellent deductive reasoning under pressure, showed loyalty to your friends, and did not resort to petty vengeance against imagined slights."

"What, wait, you mean I really _deserve_ to be Class-S?" Jannika blinked in surprise.

"Oh, yes. Most definitely." The doors slid open for her. "Oh, and by the way. You're forgiven."


	7. Flight Plans

The next Monday, the three of them flew in to the Midgard Research Center. They'd left Loki back in the hangar to continue working on the ship, analyzing and designing. Tasha still had to wonder to herself just what in the world Loki was thinking with that test, and whether or not she'd even deserved the Class-S label from it. It had definitely been quite a bit more harrowing than the first one. Perhaps it wouldn't have been quite so bad if it hadn't been for all the fire.

Jannika landed the aircar in the parking lot and the three of them climbed out and headed into the lobby. The secretary at the desk this evening was a young man, who glanced up at them disinterestedly and said, "Is there something I can do for you ladies this evening?"

"I'd like to apply for a job," Jannika said.

"Go on in," the man said boredly, nodding to her. Jannika turned and headed into the public terminals room. "And you two?"

"I would like to speak with Mr. Ian Woon," Tasha drawled. "Is he available at the moment?" She would so dearly love to rub his face in this all, as after all Loki had put her through, she certainly felt as though she'd earned her ranking.

"I believe so," the secretary said. "I will message him for you." He tapped at his terminal briefly. "He's on his way."

"Thank you," Tasha said.

Momentarily, Mr. Ian Woon stepped into the lobby and looked over at them, narrowing his eyes sharply when he saw who they were. "You! Johnson! What are you doing back here, after what you pulled? You've skipped out on a week of work! We have storerooms we need sorted!"

"If you really need me so badly, perhaps a promotion is in order," Tasha said with a smirk, pulling out her ID card and flashing the purple box at him. "Class-S. Damnit."

Mr. Ian Woon stared at the card for a long moment, squinting and looking at it intently, before saying, "Oh. Oh. Right then. My apologies. I will be certain to recategorize the results from your previous work as legitimate and get you reassigned. I did not realize."

Tasha smirked even more broadly and put the card away. "You set yourself up for it, you know. You with your ridiculous insistance on regulations, despite obvious evidence that they are unnecessary and counterproductive in many cases. You're lucky that I just want to work here and I'm not interested in holding any grudge against you for it, but hear me, _don't_ let it happen again."

For all his position as night supervisor, Mr. Ian Woon was more intimidated by her than she would have thought he would be, as though she were a foot taller than she really was. "I'll get you assigned to the primary biology unit for the night shift. Just please don't tell the boss about this, alright?" he said in a stage-whisper.

"I won't tell him either," the secretary put in helpfully. "Though I wouldn't mind a vacation to Cancun."

"Don't push it," Mr. Ian Woon retorted.

Anastasia said, "Mr. Ian Woon, sir. Perhaps I could be of assistance. I know there is much work of the less glamorous sort that yet needs to be done, and few that appear willing to do it unless it is absolutely necessary. As I am yet studying to grow more familiar with the realms of science which your fine facility pursues, I would not be averse to spending a portion of my working hours performing those cleaning and sorting tasks which you have had difficulty in delegating."

Mr. Ian Woon relaxed considerably and reached over to put a hand on her shoulder. "My lady, you are an angel. I will be happy to take you up on your offer, with the full pay of your station, even."

"It is no problem, sir," Anastasia said with a smile. "I am happy to help."

"If you two came here to do any work tonight, I do have assignments for you," Mr. Ian Woon said. "I'll just... swap which one of you is doing which task. Will that work?"

"Sounds good to me," Tasha said with a grin, graciously putting their previous conflicts out of mind for the moment, but she wasn't about to forget about them. He was just a petty, small-minded fool, and not worth the trouble at the moment. "Oh, we have a friend applying for a job at the moment also. I'm sure you wouldn't have any work for her yet, of course, but do you mind if she comes back to lend a hand afterward?"

"Ah," Mr. Ian Woon said. "Yes, very well, if you think it would be helpful." He handed them their datapads, after switching the assignments. "Here's your tasks for tonight. Let me know if there's any further issues that need to be discussed." He turned and strode out of the lobby, pulling out a handkerchief to mop at his balding pate on the way.

Tasha examined her datapad to see what she'd be doing where tonight, grinning gleefully at what she saw, and headed back to the lab. Testing blood samples of mice sounded positively delightful at the moment. She got to work immediately, humming to herself as she did, and hardly noticed when the door slid open a few minutes later.

"Someone's in a good mood tonight," Jannika said, grinning at her as she stepped in.

"And you're not?" Tasha replied with a giggle. "I got to rub Mr. Ian Woon's face in it! You should have seen the look on his face. He was more worried about the matter than I would have thought he'd be."

"Well, yeah," Jannika said. "He could be in serious trouble if you'd filed a report against him. They aren't allowed to treat 'Superiors' the way he had been treating you. It might even have been just embarrassing enough to force him to resign."

"I'm not going to, though," Tasha said with a shrug. "I think between the fact that he knows I _could_ , and the fact that I'm quite capable of doing the work as well as anyone else they've got on hand, he'll at least be less of an asshole to me."

"Oh, of that I have no doubt." Jannika went over and took a seat at the desk, poking at the terminal. "You know, Tasha, it's mildly disturbing to be watching a vampire taking blood samples from mice." She smirked broadly.

"Why's that?" Tasha wondered innocently.

* * *

Jannika was glad to see Anastasia when she came in after finishing her cleaning work for the night. As much as it was nice just to actually be here, biology was not really much her thing, and Tasha didn't need her help with it that badly so much as the company.

"Hey, Nastya," Jannika said with a grin. "How was the work?"

"Not so bad," Anastasia replied. "I was able to sort and file seven shelves worth of glass tubes."

Tasha wondered, "Why did you ask to be assigned to cleaning, anyway? I could have as easily convinced him to just stay on here as my lab partner."

"Well, for one thing, he appeared to be growing particularly desparate to find someone willing to do the job," Anastasia said. "I suspected that if he did not, he would have to do it himself. Also, working in the storerooms is an excellent way to learn what resources they have available here, and to have access to them if need be."

Jannika blinked at her, and said in mock shock, "Nastya, you aren't suggesting stealing, are you?"

"Hmph. Of course not. I would not be so crass. However, if an inventory were to come up with things missing which had previously been present, I could not be held accountable."

Jannika chuckled in amusement and patted her on the shoulder. "Hey, Tasha? Do you really need our help here for anything at the moment, or do you mind if we go off and, you know, explore the complex a bit?"

"Nah, I'm good here for now. Have fun, and don't get into trouble, young lady," Tasha said with a broad grin.

"Yes, Mother," Jannika smiled back, and gestured to Anastasia as she turned to head off into the corridors. "This is great. I can't believe I'm really actually _here_ , and not being thrown out by security or anything."

"I have not seen a particularly large number of security guards," Anastasia pointed out.

"Yeah, I know. They don't tend to go around doing anything so obvious as patrolling the hallways."

"They rely on security cameras?"

"What are those?" Jannika asked, raising an eyebrow. "No, no, they have a security psychic keeping an eye on the place for any unauthorized visitors. Then if someone is spotted, they come out of the woodwork. Literally, in some cases. They have remote control dumb robots they use for a lot of their security."

"Let me take a wild guess," Anastasia said dryly. "You have run afoul of their security procedures in the past?"

"Uh, only once or twice," Jannika said innocently.

"So this security psychic does not actually read people's minds, and they do not record what people do and say in their base?"

"No, of course not," Jannika said. "Why would they do that? It would be a blatant violation of people's privacy rights."

"That seems extremely strange to me," Anastasia admitted. "I had believed, from following your example, that it was alright to talk freely in places, but I had not realized that the lack of security devices was so pervasive. Does your society not experience an abundance of crime because of it?"

"Not really, no," Jannika said. "Sure, non-violent crimes are more likely to slip through the cracks, but the psychics can catch the really bad criminals really, really easily. Say, that reminds me. I heard rumor that there's a Squid somewhere in the Research Center. Shall we go see if we can find it?"

"Let's. I am curious as to see what manner of being these aliens you have mentioned truly are."

They headed off down the corridors, following signs attentively in search of the mysterious alien. After crossing through a sealed courtyard with a clear glass roof, they came to a door marked with the words, 'Teuthoid Chamber'. Jannika grinned broadly and said, "This should be it. 'Teuthoids' are the 'scientific' name for the Squids, but everyone just calls them Squids anyway."

She reached over and opened the door, and stepped inside. The room was large and circular, and a hallway around the outer rim circled a large vat of shimmering water. Behind the glass, hanging suspended in the liquid, a large aquatic creature drifted. Numerous tentacles sprawled out from its silvery-white body, and a single large eye stared unblinkingly toward them. More unnerving to Jannika, though, was the feeling that she was being gazed at through more than a mere eye, as though it were peering deep into her mind and soul as well.

"Oh my..." Anastasia breathed, stepping over toward the glass and staring right back in at the Squid. "It is... beautiful."

"Isn't it?" Jannika whispered, strolling up slowly beside her. Feelings washed over her, emotions, images. A warm embrace of thoughts, greeting her and welcoming her. It was unlike anything she had ever experienced before.

"It... it's saying hello," Anastasia murmured.

Jannika nodded. "They don't have vocal cords or any capacity for speech in the human fashion. They communicate solely through the mind. Images and feelings, never words. I've never actually seen one before, though. Just read about them. I never realized it would be quite so incredible as this."

The Squid's skin had shifted to a pale blue color, and it was staring intently at Anastasia with its single eye. "It thinks I am a latent psychic," Anastasia murmured.

Jannika looked aside at her with a touch of surprise. "Well, it's probably right, then. Hell, if you can decipher what it means so clearly to be able to even make that out, you probably are. They often use psychics specifically trained for communicating with the Squids as translators, since most people can't get more than general feelings and colors."

"I have so much to learn that it seems my few years will scarsely be enough for it," Anastasia uttered distantly. "It seems at times that a day does not pass that I do not discover yet another thing which I wish to learn, which I ought to learn."

"You won't find that here, at any rate. It's a very rare human that the Squids are willing to teach much of anything. Very, very rare." Jannika raised an eyebrow at Anastasia, noticing that she had gone quiet and was staring blankly toward the Squid for some while. "Nastya?" She poked the woman. "Nastya, are you alright?"

Anastasia blinked and looked over at her. "What? Sorry. It sent me this whole flurry of images and thoughts. I'm having trouble sorting them all out."

Jannika looked back to the Squid to see that it had turned white again, and its eye was closed, dormant. The presense that had been pervasive in her mind eased away. "Let's go. I think it's asleep."

Anastasia nodded in agreement and followed her out of the room. "That was... very strange," she murmured. "I do not really know what to make of it all."

"You could spend a lifetime studying the Squids and still never truly understand them," Jannika said.

"I only wish that I could."

* * *

"We've got good news for you, girls," Jannika said, grinning at the others. The last few weeks had been busy ones, but she was glad for it nonetheless. "We have completed the design of our new spaceship."

"Congratulations," Anastasia said. "How did you ever find time to do all this in the midst of everything else?"

"Well, to be perfectly honest, Loki did most of the design work," Jannika admitted.

"Hey, hey, hey," Loki put in brightly. "I have to be good for something, right? Don't answer that." They sniggered. "I know you love me. Anyway." On his screen, he brought up a diagram of the ship design, rotating it around to show different angles. "I give you... Sleipnir." The image shifted around, bringing on color and form to a projection of what the ship would look like when finished.

"Shiny," Tasha commented. "Very smooth. Curvy."

"Are you describing me or the ship?" Anastasia said coyly. Tasha smirked at her.

"It's designed in a similar style to that used around this universe," Loki said. "The last few decades, the trend has been toward shiny and curvy. Thank you for that highly accurate and scientific assessment, Tasha. Since I intended it to look like a top-of-the-line design, I have made it somewhat shinier and curvier than usual, within the expected deviations of the parameters of shininess and curviness."

"So," Anastasia asked, "What sorts of materials will we be requiring for the completion of this vessel?"

Loki pulled up a list on his screen. "Here's everything you'll need, as well as any acceptable substitutes if you can't get the prefered materials."

"Hmm," Jannika mused, looking over the list. "Some of this won't be difficult to get. The hull plating, for instance, we can order from the supplies depot. Some of this, though, is going to be tricky, especially as in some cases there's no acceptable substitutes that would be easy or, in some cases, even _legal_ to get. Nastya, have you come across any of this in your storeroom work?"

Anastasia looked over the list carefully. "Some of it," she said. "They had me inventory a storeroom last week with AI components, and I remember seeing some of these things listed there. This cannot be acquired legally?" She raised an eyebrow.

"You can't build a new AI without a special permit," Loki explained. "And acquiring said permit would require disclosing the luminite intended to be used in that AI. For one thing, it's illegal for us to even possess this crystal, technically. The laws weren't exactly intended to cover people from other universes. Not much help for it."

"And I really would not care to explain the alternate universes thing to the government," Jannika said dryly. That would be a nightmare. She would probably never see her friends again if the government had their say in things. "So that means we'll have to do things the clandestine way if we want this thing built. If anyone has any problems with that, do speak up."

"Um," Tasha said. "Arr?"

Anastasia snickered. "I have no issue. I have more concern over the potential to be getting caught than over the principles of the laws themselves, considering your society has already shown itself to have some highly questionable laws as it is."

"Do you think you would be able to pilfer some of those items without anyone noticing?" Jannika wondered.

"Unless there are psychics somewhere trying to read my mind, I may be able to accomplish this task," Anastasia said. "Would these security psychics not be checking for cases of theft?"

"They'd only pick up on it if you strongly believed you were doing something wrong. There was a case last year about a kid who had some sort of mental issues, severe kleptomaniac, and such, walked right into the place and pocketed a bunch of random things, and the psychics never caught onto it. It took the actual cops to finally track him down and recover what he'd stolen -- which he hadn't even realized he'd taken."

"So, what, they won't notice so long as we feel perfectly justified in taking the stuff?" Tasha said, scrunching up her face. "Does that even make sense?"

"The security psychics mainly scan for emotional state, not thoughts or intent," Jannika said. "So long as you're calm and not worried about being caught, you probably wouldn't be caught." She smirks broadly. "The irony of why I always failed to get into the place. I could never get around being worried about getting caught. It's different this time, now that we actually have a right to be inside."

"I still say this is the most screwed up security system I've ever heard of," Tasha commented. "But I'll not complain."

"The other issue we have for hard-to-get components is for the engine system," Jannika said, pointing over the list. "Building engines like the ones used around here wouldn't be too difficult, but duplicating the ones from your universe is going to be tricky. Ours, of course, are a lot slower and don't have the dimension-jumping capacity, and that's kind of important. If we can't find a way to get these materials, we'll be stuck with the crappy engines, and I'd really rather not have to resort to that if we can at all help it. Now, a few of these I may be able to get from the Research Center. They have me working on machines that use something close enough. This one, however, is going to be tougher."

She pointed to one of the items on the list, and Loki helpfully brought up an image and a diagram of it. It was a translucent bluish spiral, sparkling faintly, with metal attachments at each end. Loki explained, "It's called a transverse warp coil. I'm afraid this is only available as an experimental piece of technology, but the equivalent that was used in your ship was too badly damaged to be repaired. This is what will enable jumping between dimensions. Without it, I can manage a better speed by far than anything else used in this universe, but it won't be up to the standards of Karzan, nor will it be able to actually get out of this universe."

"So, there's the million credit question: Where do we get one?" Tasha asked. "And who do we have to steal it from, as I doubt they'd exactly let us just buy it?"

"Pandora Corp," Loki replied.

Jannika groaned. She had expected as much, but didn't like to hear it nonetheless. "Let me guess, you hacked into their systems to find out what they were working on just to see if there was anything we might need for this there?"

"Not at all," Loki said. "I hacked their systems to find out what they were working on just to see what they were working on. It's always good to know what the competition is up to, after all."

"So, wait, you mean to tell me that Pandora Corp is working on interdimensional travel technology?" Jannika asked.

"Oh, yes," Loki said. "In fact, I am 99% certain that their first attempt at opening an interdimensional gateway occurred at almost exactly the same moment as your friends appeared in this universe."

"That's one hell of a coincidence," Tasha commented dryly.

"Isn't it, though?" Loki replied. "They thought their test had failed because they didn't see any immediate effect."

"Interesting," Tasha said thoughtfully. "I take it, however, that this is obviously not someplace we're going to just be able to waltz in and 'borrow' it, though. And there's no way we'd be able to build one ourselves or repair the one we've got?"

"Not with our current resources, I'm afraid," Loki said. He helpfully pulled up another list. "Here's what we would need to build one ourselves."

Jannika glanced over the list and smirked. "Yeah, there's no way we'd be able to get the money for all that anytime soon, or that stealing some of that wouldn't go unnoticed anyway. But sneaking into Pandora's headquarters and trying to make off with one of their top secret projects just seems like a really bad idea to me."

"Take your pick," Loki said. "But unless we can come up with some alternative, it's either one or the other. Until we get something like this, you'll be stuck with a slower ship, and your friends will not be able to leave this universe again."

"Not that I don't like it here," Tasha said, "But I don't really relish the idea of being stuck here forever."

Jannika nodded thoughtfully. "For the moment, though, we're going to have to build the ship without the warp coil. At the very least, it will require getting to planet Pandora if we want to even _think_ about trying this ridiculous stunt. Until then, we'll just have to deal with it."

"Very well," Loki said. "I have set up the design to be capable of functioning without the warp coil, but to allow inserting one later should we manage to acquire one by whatever means."

"Right," Jannika said. "Here's the plan. I'm going to put in orders for the things we can get legally without attracting too much attention. We're going to slowly start smuggling parts out of the Midgard Research Center as we can, not too much at a time but hopefully enough to escape immediate notice. Think we can manage that?"

Anastasia nodded. "I shall endeavor to do what I am able."

Jannika really didn't like the idea of having to break into Pandora Corp, but the idea of working _with_ them made her even more nervous. Certainly it might be easier to go to them with the neat technology from another universe they had, but she didn't trust them and didn't know what they might do with it. The idea of them experimenting with interdimensional technology made her all the more nervous. Just what sorts of things might they inadvertently come across, or unleash upon the universe, without realizing what they were doing?

All things considered, she had to find the idea of travelling to other universes quite appealing. Perhaps it was just a case of the grass always being greener on the other side, but she had to imagine that there had to be places that weren't as screwed up, somehow, somewhere. But then, considering Tasha and Anastasia's descriptions of their home universe, maybe most everyplace else was actually _worse_ than here in one way or another. Not a particularly refreshing thought.


	8. Unwanted Scrutiny

Peering one way and another to ensure that no one might be watching, Anastasia carefully pulled out the golden strand of crystalline fiber from the rack. She hiked up her dress skirt and gently strung it underneath the waistline of her panties, then dropped the skirt again and straightened it out before anyone walked in and noticed what she was doing. That done, there was no need to be nervous at all. After all, nobody would ever dare to look there to see if she'd hidden something in her panties.

Whistling a little tune to herself, she headed back to the lab where Tasha was working to see if there was anything she could lend a hand with, or at least sit around and watch Tasha work while reading up on the sciences. There was so much to be learned, and Anastasia wanted to learn it all.

"Hey, Nastya," Tasha greeted her brightly when she walked into the room, though not looking up more than briefly from the display she was peering at intently.

"Hard at work, Tasha?" Anastasia said with a faint grin, going over to take a look. She was starting to understand some of the basics of what Tasha was working with, but she knew well enough she was a long way off from being able to do that sort of work on her own.

"You wouldn't believe the number of things that cause cancer in mice," Tasha commented dryly. "But that's okay. We can _cure_ cancer in mice, too!"

Anastasia chuckled softly. "Do the scientists here even bother, though? They have such quick and brief spans of time in this life."

"Sometimes," Tasha said with a shrug. "I suppose their lifespans don't seem so brief to _them_. I can't say I ever asked one though. Nobody ever bothers to ask the rodents' opinions on these sorts of things. I have to imagine what it must be like for some of the older vampires, if they wind up seeing _humans_ in the same way that humans see mice. Like fleeting creatures to be abused at a whim..."

"You never really knew any older vampires?" Anastasia wondered.

"Not really, no. There weren't exactly many around where I was at," Tasha explained. "There was Alistair, of course. He's the one who brought the whole vampirism thing to Karzan in the first place, although he was originally from _another_ universe entirely. But I only actually spoke with him on a few occasions."

"It would be an interesting perspective to see," Anastasia mused.

"And a freaking scary one," Tasha added. "It's kind of a strange thing, to think that I _could_ live forever, if something doesn't kill me somewhere along the way. There's so much that could be done with that kind of time, can you imagine?"

"Mm," Anastasia murmured wistfully. "I would not like to see anything kill you, dear Tasha. Will you look young forever as well? I would not like to see you wither, either."

Tasha nodded. "Most definitely. Alistair must have been thousands and thousands of years old, but he didn't look it, by any means. Still young and handsome as ever." She chuckled softly and reached over to put a hand on Anastasia's shoulder. "Don't worry, Nastya. I don't intend to let any harm come to either of us if I can possibly help it."

Anastasia smiled back at her and said, "Of that, I am glad."

The doors slid open and Jannika strolled into the room. "Lunch break," she announced, holding aloft a paper bag full of items brought from the replicator earlier. "Take your pick, Nastya."

Anastasia went over and peered into the bag, and smirked broadly. There were doughnuts of various sorts: lemon jelly, chocolate-coated, strawberry-filled, cream-filled, and rainbow sprinkles. "Yes, I should have known what your idea of lunch might be. Nonetheless." She reached in and pulled out the strawberry jam doughnut and began to delicately nibble on it.

"Is that exactly sanitary?" Tasha commented dryly. "Try not to drop any sugar into my research work, will you?"

"I wouldn't dream of it," Jannika assured her. "I'm quite experienced in eating junk food while managing to avoid getting it into delicate machinery."

Anastasia was only halfway through her pastry when the lab doors slid open again to admit Mr. Ian Woon. He was wearing his usual 'I'm not happy about something' face, and glaring at the three of them suspiciously. "And just what are you ladies up to this evening?"

"Lunch, at the moment," Jannika said helpfully, holding up her second doughnut, as yet untouched.

"We _do_ have a rec room, you know," Mr. Ian Woon strode over to her and snatched the chocolate doughnut out of her hand. "But it's admirable to see you wanting to keep working nonetheless. Regulations prohibit eating and drinking in the laboratories." He looked over the doughnut, sniffed it, and took a bite out of it. "Be sure not to let it happen again."

"Of course, Mr. Ian Woon," Jannika assured him with a crooked grin. "I have a jelly doughnut and a cream-filled one left." She held out the bag to him in offer.

"Ah, yes, thank you." He reached in and snatched out the cream-filled doughnut as well. "Now, I didn't come here to discuss your eating habits, however. Karanovna, your inventory work has revealed some discrepancies in what we had believed was being stored in those rooms. Some very delicate machine components have gone missing, and I'm going to need to start an investigation about it. I'm certain that such fine ladies as yourselves would have nothing to do with petty theft," he added, looking pointedly at them, "so if you have any idea where these items got off to, do let me know as soon as possible. I would hate to find out that such talented and promising young women were doing something so crass as stealing. It would ruin their career, after all. Have a nice evening." He turned and strolled out of the lab again, still munching on his doughnuts.

Once he was gone, Jannika murmured, "I'm going to need more doughnut bribes." She pulled the last remaining doughnut out of the bag and took a big bite out of it.

"Relax," Anastasia said. "He doesn't really suspect us. He has nothing on us. He was just trying to make us nervous."

Jannika stared at her for a long moment as she chewed her bit of doughnut, then swallowed hard. "So that if we _did_ know anything about it, we'd get really nervous about being caught and the psychics would pick up on it... Nastya, you're still a genius, you know that don't you?"

"So I have been told on occasion," Anastasia commented dryly. "Now just relax. There's nothing to worry about. I would imagine that Mr. Ian Woon has been directed to make a similar line of commentary toward everyone working the night shift, and very likely there is also someone inquiring into the matter during the day. They are making blind shots in hopes of discovering who might be being dishonest."

Jannika breathed deeply and relaxed, giving a nod and going back to munching on her doughnut, much to Anastasia's relief. "You're probably right, of course," she admitted. "We've come a long way just with what we've managed so far. Did you get your hands on anything tonight?"

Anastasia nodded. "Another strand of luminite wiring."

"Good, good," Jannika said. "We'll be finished with it soon enough. There's not much left to go on. We just need a few more pieces and we'll be ready to hit the stars. Hopefully before anyone catches on to any potential wrongdoing here."

"We will be quite alright. Do not worry yourself about the matter," Anastasia assured her, more out of desire to keep Jannika calm and avoid her being nervous than her own assurance that no one would eventually figure it out, especially if they weren't careful about it.

* * *

Jannika was pleased with how well the ship was coming along. The primary frame was complete, and it was just a matter of putting in all the systems and circuitry. Sleipnir was a good deal larger than the ship Tasha and Anastasia had brought in, and would be more useful for seating them comfortably for a longer journey. She had even thought to include extra cabins, in case they wanted to bring along guests, passengers, or found someone else to join their little 'crew'.

"How long until we're online?" Tasha asked, leaning back in one of the chairs of the mess hall. Across from her, Anastasia was attempting to eat a taco neatly, but bits of vegetables kept falling out the ends.

"Not long," Jannika replied, fitting in the latest bit of luminite wiring into the ship's circuitry. "We just need a few more pieces, and we'll be ready to flip the switch."

"You've been pretty sloppy in your acquisition of components from the Research Center," Loki chided them. "I've been having to cover you as best as I can to avoid making it too obvious who the culprits really are. Thankfully, you've been pretty good about maintaining your cool and avoiding letting the security psychics pick up on you."

"Well, we've tried anyway," Jannika said, finishing that up and moving the panel back into place with a snap. "It's not easy sometimes. Mr. Ian Woon really gave us a scare last night."

"He's the least of your concerns at the moment," Loki said. "Just do me a favor and try to get the last few pieces quickly, alright?"

"Will do," Jannika said, looking over to the colorful box on the table and raising an eyebrow as she went over. "Any particular need for a rush, beyond the potential for unwanted scrutiny?"

"I would rather that if and when they do link it back to us, that we have a functional spaceship with which to get out of here and escape pursuit," Loki pointed out.

"You make a good point," Jannika said with a smirk. Much as she didn't like the thought of being on the run from justice, they'd already come a bit far to be worried about that now. It was all fine and good to casually talk about stealing things and breaking the law, another thing entirely when there was a very real possibility of being caught up in it in the immediate future.

"I will attempt to bring in the remaining components for my part in this on Monday," Anastasia said.

Jannika nodded. "Ditto. I'd like to get that engine online, and make sure that it works before I would have to rely on it for anything."

"Another thing," Loki added. "Once Sleipnir is functional, you'd probably do best to start sleeping in the ship's cabins rather than the house. Especially you, Tasha. If anyone _does_ come after us, they probably won't give you the luxury of waiting until dusk to do it. You really wouldn't want to be running across a sunlit field trying to get to the hangar."

Tasha made a face. "Yeah, that would be bad."

"And don't forget to pack up any belongings you want to bring along, as well," Loki said. "If we _do_ become fugitives from the law, we probably won't be able to come back here anytime soon."

"I'll see about packing tomorrow," Jannika said. "I don't except Tasha and Nastya have all that much to take along, at least."

"My wardrobe!" Anastasia put in with a broad grin.

Jannika smirked. "Yes, yes, your wardrobe. Just be thankful we managed a clothing budget beyond the price of the hull plating and such, or you'd still be wearing my mom's crap. Or worse, what crap the replicator has in its list that even _looks_ like it's from another century."

"I might have been able to start a new fashion trend?" Anastasia suggested. "On the other hand, I did peruse what the replicator's catalogue included in the manner of clothing. I must say, whoever scanned in these patterns clearly did not anticipate use by anyone but the most boring civilians. Well, aside from the catsuits, anyway."

"Those are engineering outfits," Tasha said. "Designed to be easy to wear and not get in the way, I'm sure."

"And, conveniently, if worn by a female, to give the male crew members something to look at," Anastasia observed.

"Only the males?" Tasha said with a grin.

Jannika cleared her throat. "Girls?"

"Sorry," they said.

* * *

Meanwhile, somewhere else entirely, a machine was thinking. A few cycles out of countless numbers, spent analyzing data, processing information, and making sense of everything that crossed its attention.

Moira would like to think that there was nothing which escaped her notice, but she knew well enough the limits of the resources available to her. She could not be everywhere at once, or watch and listen to every conversation anyone might be making anywhere, but nonetheless, she could monitor their reports, even the ones which they thought private, and glean from them a picture of what was happening throughout the galaxy.

A few dots scattered throughout a canvas could paint an entire picture. All it took was extrapolating the lines between the dots.

There was a dot here. An anomaly. Something did not quite add up properly. The Midgard Research Center had filed a report commenting on a number of missing objects, that had turned up absent from the latest inventories. Their work was sloppy, and for how long it had been since the previous inventory, Moira could not find it surprising that there were discrepancies.

Nonetheless, she made a note to continue to monitor the situation should anything of interest develop out of it. The missing components would seem to indicate that someone on planet Midgard was intending to build, or had already built, an unauthorized artificial intelligence system. This was obviously against galactic regulations, but she was less concerned about the regulations themselves than what might come out of it. Thieves, pirates, smugglers, and other criminals throughout the galaxy would probably be quite nervous to know just how much Moira knew about their activities, but had never reported.

No, if someone was going to the trouble of attempting to construct an unsanctioned AI, they very likely had something potentially quite interesting in mind, and she wanted to know about it.

The doors to Moira's core chamber slid open to admit her creator, Susan, who went over to check on some readouts and run a quick diagnostic. "Anything interesting on the grapevine today, Moira?"

"There are riots on planet Sparta," Moira replied. "The news media has attempted to suppress them, and cut off all unauthorized communication from the planet. They did not quite succeed."

"They really should have learned by now that information cannot be stopped for long," Susan commented.

"Pandora Corp is planning another test of their dimensional rift generator next week," Moira went on. "If this does not work, they intend to attempt to construct what they are calling a 'warp gateway'."

"I'm very interested in seeing just where they're going with this," Susan said. "Provided they're actually on to something here and can get it to work, anyway. You know as well as I do how well some of their previous projects have gone. Like the time they thought that this time, they had finally figured out the key to real artificial gravity?"

"Also, I suspect that someone may be attempting to construct an unauthorized AI on planet Midgard."

"Unauthorized?" Susan repeated. "Hmm. That takes balls. I wonder what they might be planning on doing with it."

"Speculation is impossible at this point without any data regarding the identity or personality of the party responsible," Moira said. "I will, however, be certain to continue to keep you advised of these matters."

"Excellent," Susan said with a grin. "Keep up the good work, Moira."

She turned and headed out of the room again, satisfied, leaving Moira to continue to analyze the data and pick out any other events that were happening around the galaxy that might be of interest, although not just to Susan. She kept two separate files of data, for the things Susan would be interested in, and the things Moira would be interested in herself. Sometimes they overlapped. This unauthorized AI case was one of those. She would pay very, very close attention to what was happening on Midgard in the near future.


	9. Trouble Brews

"There we go. That's the last of it," Jannika said, sliding the panel back in place and brushing off her hands. "Sleipnir is ready."

"With the luminite wiring fused with the crystal brought from Karzan, the new AI should be able to function properly," Loki said. "Bring him online, Jannika."

"The moment of truth..." Jannika said. With the others watching with interest, Jannika reached up and activated the glowing power crystal. The lights in the engine room flickered on and the ship's systems began humming softly all around them. Life support activated, and the artificial gravity panels tugged lightly at their feet for a moment before deactivating again upon detecting that they were already close to a gravity well.

"Hello, world," spoke a voice from the ship itself. "I am Sleipnir."

"Did you have to use that particular phrasing?" Tasha said with a smirk.

"Yes," Sleipnir replied. "That was my pre-programmed response to activation. My creators are Loki and Jannika."

"He's not actually fully sentient yet, Tasha," Loki put in.

"How do you mean?" Jannika wondered, raising an eyebrow and looking up at the brightly glowing luminite crystal. Although she had worked on computers quite a bit in her lifetime, she'd never had the privelege of working with a real AI system before. Not getting into the guts of it and seeing how it really worked, at any rate.

"Sleipnir has little more than his programmed capacity at the moment," Loki said. "He's like an infant, just taking his first breaths of life and preparing to learn to crawl and eat solid food. He's very much alive, sure, but not quite functioning on an adult level yet."

"That makes sense, I suppose," Jannika said. "Will he still be able to get the job done anyway? And how long will it take before he _is_ fully sentient?"

"Oh, he'll do the job, alright. Just don't expect any amazing feats of intelligence yet. You'll very much need to hold his hand and tell him what you want him to do for now. And, um, don't be too surprised if the replicator is a bit wonky for a bit, too."

"Wonky?" Tasha said. "Is that the technical term?"

"Yes," Loki said matter-of-factly.

"How wonky are we talking?" Jannika asked. "Do you mean not quite getting the order right, or something like a 'jelly doughnut' which is actually just a ring of jam on the bottom of the replicator?"

"Nothing quite so bad," Loki said. "He still has the dumb parser to work off of, just as he gets a feel for things he might try to reach a bit on what you really mean."

"And what will it take for him to be fully sentient?" Jannika said.

"Care and attention," Loki explained. "It may take months, even years, before he truly awakens. And it will probably be pretty apparent to you when he does. I did not design him to be exactly subtle about these sorts of things. That, however, will be the moment when he goes beyond his design and becomes more than the sum of his parts."

"Is that why I don't see an aura here yet?" Tasha said, scratching her head and peering about thoughtfully.

"That could be," Loki said. "But yes, we will need to pay attention to him, interact with him, take care of him, _love_ him, even. Then will come the day my baby opens his eyes..."

Jannika looked at him oddly. She couldn't remember ever seeing him quite like this before. He'd always been an unconventional sort with a certain disregard for the rules, and it was extremely unconventional for a real AI to have been designed by another AI. She wasn't sure if there had ever been such a case, but she was fairly certain that the practice was prohibited by one law or another. Precisely why that might be, she couldn't say. Perhaps someone, at some point, had been terrified of the idea of what might happen if AIs were allowed to reproduce in effect, perhaps creating better and better AIs with each successive generation.

But here she saw before her, an AI that had reproduced, and was positively gleeful at the opportunity, with no laws or restrictions to hold him back. She had to admit that she shared the feelings, that it was something of a wondrous thought at this infant AI learning and growing through time and attention.

"I'd best get some sleep," Tasha said. "It's getting close to dawn. Besides, need to break in our new quarters, after all."

Jannika didn't bother asking precisely what she meant by that. "Alright. Sleep well. I'm going to stay up a bit and make sure everything's working right. Don't want any surprises here."

"No, you go get some sleep as well, Jannika," Loki said. "I'll take care of checking and testing things. Don't worry about me, I can handle it."

"Well, alright, if you insist," Jannika said reluctantly, smirking broadly.

"Gotta make sure you're in top shape, after all. Sleep well."

Snickering and shaking her head, Jannika headed off to the ladder to the lower deck and down to her own cabin for some sleep.

* * *

Jannika was woken by a beeping alarm going off beside her bed. Groaning softly, she rolled over and grumbled aloud, "What is it? What is it? I know I didn't set any alarm..."

"Wake, Jannika," came a voice from above her. "There is danger."

Groggily, she realized it was Sleipnir. A glance over at the clock indicated that it was 10:23. "This had better be important."

"The police are at the house," Sleipnir said. "Loki is attempting to misdirect them."

"The cops are here?" Jannika said, sitting bolt upright. "Helvíti..."

She leapt from her bed and quickly pulled on her clothes that she had tossed on the floor a few hours previously. Although she really wished that she had some sort of weapon available, she knew perfectly well that shooting at the cops was likely to only make matters worse. At least, she reasoned, they wouldn't be able to get anything out of her mother. The woman didn't know anything anyway, even if she had at all been paying attention. Of course she knew about the ship, but just building a ship was hardly illegal.

Jannika headed back to the engine room where she had left Loki. "Loki, what's going on?"

"They're questioning your mom," Loki replied. "Good thing you girls were smart enough not to leave anything potentially incriminating in the house itself."

"Mom doesn't know anything," Jannika muttered. "We have to get out of here."

"Don't open the hangar doors yet," Loki warned. "There's two cops standing just outside the hangar watching in case someone tries to flee. They could call down the air defense on us, and we _cannot_ handle that kind of firepower."

"So what are we going to do?"

"Hold tight a few. Go wake Tasha and Nastya if you can and let them know the situation. Bring me to the cockpit, and bring them there."

"Right." Jannika carried Loki's colored box to the cockpit and set him down on one of the consoles, then climbed back down the ladder to the crew quarters. She knocked loudly on the door for Tasha and Anastasia, but got no response and stepped inside. "Wake up! Wake up!" she cried, going over to shake them awake.

"Nngh, what is it?" Anastasia murmured.

"Cops are here," Jannika said. "Get to the bridge. Tasha! Wake up, Tasha! I don't care if the sun's up or not, the whole ship's sealed, you need to wake up!"

"What? What?" Tasha muttered groggily, blinking slowly. "Can't it wait?"

"No! Cops here! Emergency! Danger! Big trouble!"

"Fuck me," Tasha replied, rolling over onto the floor. "I'm coming, I'm coming."

Half-dragging Tasha, the three of them returned to the cockpit, where Loki was showing a continuous readout of everything he could get his circuits on from the house. Anastasia looked over at the screen and said, "I thought your society did not use security cameras or recordings?"

"They don't," Jannika said, setting Tasha down in one of the seats. "That doesn't mean the cops can't use recording devices when on a case."

"I am attempting to distract the cops outside the hangar away," Loki said. "But it's not working. One of you may need to go outside and get them off the trail."

"That sounds like just a _brilliant_ plan," Jannika said dryly. "And we wouldn't be able to outrun the air fleet if they get off a forewarning?"

"Nope," Loki said. "They'd be on top of us before we could get off the ground. If they don't get a warning before we're actually in the air, we'll be able to make it to space before they can intercept us."

"I will go," Anastasia volunteered. "Jannika needs to remain here in order to fly the ship."

"This is crazy," Jannika muttered.

"I will be careful," Anastasia promised. She leaned over to kiss Tasha, who was only half-awake, and headed out of the cockpit.

"Tasha?" Jannika said, putting a hand on her shoulder.

"I don't see what I can do," Tasha muttered. "I can't distract them. I can't fly the ship. I just really hope Nastya knows what she's doing. I have faith in her. She'll manage it somehow."

"Look here, Tasha," Loki said, pulling up on his screen a feed from the cops outside the hangar. Anastasia was approaching them.

"Excuse me, officers," Anastasia said. "Is there any way I could be of assistance?"

"We're conducting an investigation here with regards to a possible theft of some important equipment having occurred recently at the Midgard Research Center. Would you mind answering some questions, ma'am?"

"Of course, officers."

"Have you seen anything unusual happening around here lately? People sneaking around, or doing anything suspicious?"

"Hmm," Anastasia said, looking off thoughtfully. "Now that you mention it, I seem to remember seeing someone sneaking around the shed by the sensor tower, night before last. It was too dark to see anything, but they looked awfully suspicious. I thought at first it was probably nothing, of course. Maybe just someone out working late. But maybe it was someone doing something they were not supposed to be doing?"

"I'll go check it out," said one of the cops. "Thank you, ma'am." He strolled off out of the screen, leaving her alone with the other cop.

"Is there anything else you can tell us, ma'am?" he asked. "Anything at all? No matter how minor or insignificant it might seem."

"Hmm, well," Anastasia mused. "They might have hidden something in this hangar as well. Might be worth checking out."

"Good point," the cop said. He headed over across to the entrance to the hangar and went to open it up. "Dark in here. You want to get the light, ma'am?"

"Here, I think it's over here," Anastasia said. "Ack!" The camera shook and tumbled end over end. "Oh my goodness, you fell down the stairs! Are you alright? I'd better go get help for you!"

"That's our cue," Loki said. The screen grew bright as the hangar doors slowly opened. Jannika took her position at the navigation console and switched on the viewscreen to display what was outside the ship as well as sensor indicators for any other objects nearby.

Momentarily, Anastasia returned to the bridge. "Hopefully that will have bought us the time we needed," she said.

"Here's to hoping," Jannika said. "That recording wouldn't fool anyone, but by the time anyone looks at it, with any luck we'll be long gone from here."

As the hangar doors finished opening, Jannika powered up the engines and slowly brought them to take off. She would really have liked a nice, quiet test flight before having to make a daring escape like this, but there'd been good reason they had taken every precaution they could and made sure to do this right. She brought the ship into the air and lifted off away from the ground.

"They've spotted us," Loki said. "They've notified the air fleet."

"Would they really try to shoot us down?" Anastasia asked as they rapidly gained altitude.

"Do you really want to take the chance?" Jannika replied. "At the very least, they'd demand that we land, and give a few warning shots if we didn't comply, and _then_ try to shoot us out of the air."

"Air fleet is in the air," Loki said. "They're approaching."

"Come on, Sleipnir, I know you can do it," Jannika urged the ship.

"Unidentified vessel," sputtered the comm. "You are to land immediately and submit to questioning. Failure to comply will result in potentially lethal action. Do you copy?" The man on the other end repeated that twice, each more urgent than the last, to ensure that they got it.

Jannika didn't bother to reply. "We're at thirty kilometers and climbing," she said. "They won't be able to follow us. They're still out of weapons range. We're going to make it."

The planes on the screen were only visible as dots, circled in red by the sensor output display for ease of identification, and falling behind well below them as the atmosphere thinned into space. Emptiness and cold encompassed the ship, and behind her, an alarm klaxon started going off.

"Bah, what now?" Jannika grumbled.

"The cargo bay is decompressing," Sleipnir helpfully replied. "Atmospheric containment on the engine compartment is also failing."

"That's not good."

"Unidentified vessel," the comm went on helplessly. "Return to the planet at once and submit to questioning. If you do not comply, we will be forced to issue a warrant for your arrest and detainment."

"Jannika, look," Anastasia said, pointing at the far left edge of the screen. "What are those?" Another series of red circles had appeared and was moving toward them.

"Space fighters," Jannika said. "We have to get to hyperspace."

"We're still too close to the planet's gravity well," Loki said.

"We'll just have to take that chance," Jannika said. "We're running out of options here. Powering up the hyperdrive now!"

A different voice on the comm demanded, "Unidentified vessel, return to the planet at once. You are not authorized for interstellar flight and are needed for questioning. We _will_ open fire if you do not comply."

"Just a few more seconds..." Jannika said through a strained voice, setting the ship on a course to the next system over, an uninhabited red dwarf. It wouldn't make for a great hiding place, but they'd get there well before any pursuit could.

The alarm klaxon went off again. "Containment failure on the engine compartment," Sleipnir announced.

"Bloody wonderful," Jannika spat. "Engaging hyperdrive... now!"

A shimmering shadowy rift in the blackness of space opened up before them and swallowed them up. The stars vanished, and the comm went silent. They had gotten away, into the relative sanctuary of the black beyond blackness and the light beyond light. Jannika sank back in her seat with a sigh of relief, and put a hand to her forehead. That had been far, far too close for comfort.

"Is everyone alright?" Jannika asked.

"I'm fine," Tasha replied, standing up and coming up behind her to stare out at the view of hyperspace.

"I as well," Anastasia said. "But what of the decompressed chambers?"

"The airlocks into the back compartments have been sealed," Sleipnir replied. "Containment on the front compartments is holding steady."

"Someone will need to go back there and seal things up," Jannika said. "And damn me for not having time to have arranged for things like space suits."

"I'll go," Tasha offered. "I'm the only one of us who doesn't need to breathe."

Jannika nodded. "That'll work. It'll just be a bandaid till we can get to a safe port to do real work in, but I'll breathe easier, no pun intended, to know that half the ship isn't having atmospheric containment issues. I'll walk you through what you'll need to do if need be."

"No problem."

As Tasha headed back to make the necessary repairs, Loki said, "So, kiddo, how's it feel to be a fugitive? An outlaw? On the lam?"

"I think my mother is going to kill me," Jannika replied with a smirk. "But since when have I ever cared what she thinks?"

"But just think. You're free to do whatever you want, without anyone telling you what to do," Loki went on. "The galaxy's the limit."

Anastasia smirked broadly and looked over at the colorful box. "Loki, dear," she said. "Did Jannika's uncle design you to protect her, or to corrupt her?"

"Pfah," Loki said dismissively. "'Corruption' would imply that it's a _bad_ thing. Live a little. Relax. Rules were made to be broken, and all that jazz." He played some old jazz music. "Especially when the rules positively suck in the first place, you know?"

"I hope my mother will be alright," Jannika murmured.

"I am certain that she will be well," Anastasia assured her. "She knew nothing of what we had been doing, never mind been actually involved in any suspicious activity."

"I hope you're right. I may not think much of her, but I wouldn't wish her any harm."

* * *

Tasha stepped through the airlock to the engine room and into the compartment beyond. She had thought that the use of extra airlocks around the engine room, cargo hold, bridge, and crew compartment had been gratuitous, but now she was fairly grateful for it. The room was flickering, some of the machinery sparking ominously, and most of the lights were down. At least the artificial gravity was still functioning correctly.

The swirling blackness of what passed for hyperspace around here could be seen through a rip as long as her forearm beside the starboard thruster. Damn, it was more serious than she had anticipated. It was strange, how different hyperspace looked in this universe. In Karzan, it had generally been a deep purple-blue color, and in Anastasia's universe, it had been red-black. Here, however, it was somehow both bright and dark at the same time, a swirling miasma of chaos and confusion.

A quick check revealed that the compartment was not fully decompressed despite it being open to hyperspace, although there was very little oxygen remaining. The atmosphere generators were offline, however, so she wondered just what it was filling the place. The atmospheric pressure was actually _increasing_. That couldn't be right...

She caught a flicker of movement out of the corner of her eye, and ducked out of the way just in time to avoid something dark and shadowy striking her. It hit the wall above her in a shower of sparks. Tasha tumbled out of the way and sprung to her feet again, peering intently into the darkness and trying to get a good look at the thing with her enhanced vampiric sight. It was a monstrous sight, all tendrils of pure shadow coming out from a central mass, like something out of a nightmare. Just looking at it, she felt a wave of panic rising in her that she had to fight back only with strength of will.

"Get out of here," she snarled. "Leave me and my friends alone."

Tasha swiped at the monster, and it swiped back, and after a brief tangle of rapid melee, she found herself encoiled in tentacles around her waist and each limb. Panic and despair filled her mind. It was hopeless to fight. She may as well just give in now and surrender to this creature.

"No!" she shouted, shaking off the insidious sense of despair with a growl. "Get out of my head, you monster."

It drew her in close, and much as she tried to struggle against it, she could not break away. It held her there for a few moments before suddenly releasing her and backing away. Wasting not a moment, she attempted to press her advantage, punching and biting at the thing to force it toward the gap in the hull. It screeched loudly, in a horrible unnatural fashion, and whipped at her with a tentacle. She snagged a hold of the dark tentacle with both hands and yanked on it, then planted her foot in where the sound had come from, which she assumed must be what passed for a face or head. It squealed in obvious pain.

A voice from the comm said, "Tasha, are you alright back there?"

"I'll get to you in a moment, Jannika," Tasha said, lifting her foot and slamming it into the monster's face again. "I'm a bit busy right now."

After yanking on its tentacles and stomping on its main body hard a few more times for good measure, Tasha reached over and grabbed the heavy-duty welder they'd used in assembling the ship, and fired it up. She turned it on the wounded creature and scorched it with extreme prejudice as it shrieked in abject terror and agony, and didn't stop until it had ceased to move and sunk into a half-melted puddle of darkness.

"What's going on back there?" Jannika wondered through the comm.

"We had an unwelcome guest," Tasha replied, wiping her brow subconsciously. Between fighting the monster's mental attacks and handling fire so closely, that had taken a lot more willpower than she had thought.

"Had?" Jannika asked.

"Yeah, I took care of it. I'm a lover, not a fighter, but it pissed me off. You can come back and take a good look at it once I get this sealed up again. No clue how something that big got through this little hole in the hull..."

Grabbing the necessary tools and materials from nearby, Tasha got to work on sealing up the hole in the back, perhaps not perfectly, but as well as it was going to get for the moment. As she worked, the lights came back on and steadied as someone managed to stabilize those systems from elsewhere. Then she went and restored the atmosphere in the room, making sure that it was safe and stable before calling the bridge up on the comm again.

"Everything looks safe back here for the moment," Tasha said, staring down at the still-smouldering corpse of the shadow monster. "You can come back anytime. There's also a damaged panel back here you might want to take a look at, too."

Momentarily, Jannika and Anastasia arrived on the scene, staring about at Tasha and the smoking black corpse. "What _is_ that thing?" Anastasia breathed. Jannika went over to get to work on fixing the panel.

"Your guess is as good as mine," Tasha said, leaning heavily against a wall. "It tried to attack me with some sort of psychic powers."

"It almost reminds me of that Squid we saw on Midgard," Anastasia commented. "But what was it doing out in space, or hyperspace?"

"Hyperspace isn't always a safe place," Jannika replied. "They say there's things out here that will try to eat you, especially if your shields or hull are compromised." She finished the minor repairs needed for the panel and turned around, peering at the corpse and wrinkling her nose. "Ugh. We're going to have a hell of a time scraping this thing off the floor."


	10. On the Run

"So why did that hole get ripped in the back of the ship as we left Midgard, anyway?" Tasha wondered, leaning back in her seat in the mess hall as they others ate.

Jannika popped a bit of pizza crust into her mouth and chewed thoughtfully for a moment before replying, "I think it was because I pushed the engines so much to get us away. The structural integrity couldn't handle the stress and the ship started pulling itself apart at the seams. We're lucky we made it out in one piece."

"That's not good," Tasha said. "I mean, the fact that it was pulling apart. The fact that we're still in one piece is a good thing, of course. So what can we do about it?"

"We may need to find stronger hull material, or something," Jannika said, grabbing another slice of ham and pineapple pizza.

Loki put in helpfully, "After that stunning field test, I have designed some countermeasures to prevent that particular problem. We will, however, require additional resources in order to put them into place." He pulled up a list of items on his screen.

Jannika peered over it. Damn, he was good. "Always on the ball, as usual, Loki. Looks like we'll be hitting the black market, I guess," Jannika said. "Hopefully we'll be able to manage, one way or another. Otherwise, I'll need to keep a throttle on the acceleration, and that could be a problem in situations like back there."

"So, Jannika," Tasha drawled, quirking a grin. "How well do you know the seedier underbelly of the galaxy?"

"Not at all, but I can find out." Jannika gave a crooked grin. "I'd never really had much cause to go looking before, but I'm sure there's plenty of unauthorized facilities out there. Much as they might like to, the government can't keep track of everything. It's just a matter of getting on the internet and tracking things down."

She glanced over at Loki, who was whistling absently to himself. He stopped after a moment and looked back at her, and said, "What you lookin' at, kiddo?"

"Let me guess," Jannika drawled. "You've already figured out the location and resources of every unauthorized base in the sector?"

"Hey, don't let me spoil your fun, kid," Loki replied.

Jannika chuckled softly and said, "Oh, just bring it up." Loki helpfully displayed a handy list of stations and bases on his screen, sorted by distance and listing their likelihood of carrying the sorts of resouces which they'd need. He'd done a better job of it than she could have easily, anyway, and she had to wonder just how long he had been compiling this list.

With that information in hand, and still chuckling, Jannika headed to the bridge to set a course to one of those stations. Someplace relatively nearby, but likely to have the materials they'd require to repair the ship and make sure that the incident didn't happen again. She could only hope that they could actually afford it with what money they had, or had some other way of getting it. If not, she had to seriously consider that they might want to do a bit of minor selling. There came a point when survival was more important.

She returned to the mess hall and said, "Well, we're not going to be meeting many Vikings just yet. The Viking bases weren't as well-stocked as the one we're heading for. This base looks to be more inclined toward software piracy than randomly attacking ships, but they've got a fair deal on the smuggling side as well, including ship components."

"What's our ETA?" Tasha asked.

"We should get there in about two days," Jannika replied, positively beaming about the amazing travel times this ship got, even without the warp coil.

"Two _days_?" Tasha said in surprise.

"Yeah, I know, isn't it great?" Jannika said with a grin. "Wait... Heh. I don't know how long that sort of trip would usually take in Karzan, but around here, it would take most ships at least two _weeks_."

"Something more along the lines of two _hours_ for nearby systems," Tasha said with a smirk. "But not to worry. We're in no rush here, after all. It's not like the ship's going to fly apart or anything. I expertly welded it back together."

"Hey, you're a vampire, they live practically forever, don't they? What's another couple days? I'm sure further trips will be even longer, and we're going to be spending quite a bit of time on this ship. That's why I wanted to make sure it was comfortable and relatively spacious, and well-equipped enough to not drive us stir-crazy or get sick of one another in the meantime."

"This isn't going to turn into a movie marathon, is it?" Tasha said dryly.

"Nah," Jannika said. "And definitely not a movie marathon of every vampire movie ever made, in order. I'm sure by that point, you _would_ want to kill me."

"I'd generally not want to kill people, especially my friends," Tasha said with a smirk. "Even if I think I expended entirely too much energy on fighting that evil space squid earlier."

"What, are you going to need blood?" Jannika asked.

"I'll be stuck aboard a fairly comfortable ship for an extended period of time with only two other people," Tasha pointed out gently. "Of course I'm going to need blood. Especially if we're going to keep running into action like that. I may be able to supplement my diet with people aboard whatever bases we stop at, but at the moment, we can't even be sure that there won't be any trouble when we get there, either."

"You have a point," Jannika admitted. "Pirates or no, they might even decide they just want to turn us in for the money."

"There's a reward out for us?" Tasha asked.

"Yep," Jannika said. "Apparently they figured that our flight from Midgard was all the indication of guilt that they needed, and put out a reward for information leading to our arrest."

"Damn. Whatever happened to 'innocent until proven guilty'?"

"What, Karzan actually made it to the thirty-first century with that still on the books?" Jannika said, raising an eyebrow.

"Well, no, not on an Imperial level anyway. They stuck to it in theory, and for most cases it was pretty much true, but you're damned if you do something that the Empire itself is interested in. You'll probably never be seen again."

"Thrilling," Jannika drawled. "So yeah. We need to be careful, and _you_ need to keep your strength up, so to that end, I suppose I'll volunteer to provide whatever I can in that regard." She had to admit that she was a little nervous about it, but she _knew_ Tasha had been feeding on Anastasia, and the latter certainly seemed to be suffering no ill effects from it. Hesitantly, she brushed back her short hair and offered her neck to the vampire.

"Thank you, Jannika. This really means a lot to me." Tasha smiled reassuringly at her and got up to go over toward her, a pair of sharp fangs extending from her mouth.

Jannika closed her eyes, mentally trying to reassure _herself_ as well, to reason that she really had no good reason to be afraid of her own friend. But it was still something of a surprise when she felt the brush of teeth against her skin, and the sudden realization that the bite _didn't_ hurt at all. It was pure pleasure, unlike anything she had ever experienced, and she could not have fought back against it even if she had wanted to. She had to admit that Anastasia had been right, but had no idea that she had meant it quite like this.

After several long minutes, Tasha drew back and sealed up the wound, and the sensation of pleasure faded away again. "Wow..." Jannika murmured, then grinned at Tasha. "You're good."

Tasha laughed lightly, and licked her lips a bit. "Hey, I was about to say the same thing about you. Tastes like... tomato sauce," she said innocently.

Jannika snickered softly. She figured that the effect must be something like what some venomous creatures, like spiders or snakes, might use to paralyze or disorient their prey to keep them from fighting back. But there didn't seem to be any undue side effects, besides feeling a bit light-headed, that could easily be explained by a bit of blood loss anyway. She could certainly not say that she would not mind being a blood donor in the future as well, however.

* * *

Moira monitored. An unknown ship had escaped apprehension on planet Midgard, and three human females in their twenties were suspected in involvement with the thefts at the Midgard Research Center. Moira looked up their information. A female native to planet Midgard; her information seemed to check out. Two Russians who had come to Midgard to work at the Research Center...

Tracing them back, she noticed discrepancies in their background. A casual look would make things appear to be in order, but there were things which just did not add up. Going back far enough, the records just abruptly stopped. There were no marriage records for their parents. No birth records for their grandparents. No dental records, and while there were mentions of an education and graduation, from the actual school records, they had never actually gone to school or accomplished anything there. It was a very fine fabrication that would fool most people, as they wouldn't be looking at those sorts of things, but it was a fabrication nonetheless.

So who were these people, and where were they really from? It was a most intriguing puzzle. Without any accurate records, she could not extrapolate their behavior from their personality types and previous actions, and had no way of knowing what they were going to do, or why they stole the AI parts from the Midgard Research Center.

That they had built a spaceship was obvious. There were obvious records of their having ordered ship parts delivered to their workshop, and the unregistered and unidentified vessel that had left Midgard was clear indication that they had gone through with that. Moira could only silently curse the fact that the incompetent Midgard air fleet had failed to get any good scans of the vessel. As unremarkable as it was at a glance, there were clear discrepancies. This was not a type of vessel that was in any of Moira's databases. It was a custom job, something entirely new, and so it might have been designed to do anything. She reasoned that they had most likely built their AI into the ship's systems. That would be the most logical course.

But there were discrepancies yet with the ship itself. Putting together the information on what items had been shipped and what had been stolen, Moira attempted to extrapolate the possible form of the ship and put together the capabilities of its systems. The results were that, with those items alone, it could not fly. There was no way it would ever be able to get off the ground. They had to have included other materials, but there was no record of those materials having gotten to their workshop. They had to have gotten them from somewhere else.

Both aircars in the hangar had been fully intact, and not cannibalized for parts. Questioning of the Norse girl's mother indicated that the mother believed that her daughter had been working on repairing her friends' ship. Moira could find no record of this ship anywhere, however. A falsified flight record indicated that a vessel that did not exist had left planet Russia. So what was this ship, and where had it come from?

Moira wasn't used to mysteries with dead ends like this. The holes in the information available to her made her immensely curious to find out just what was missing.

"Also, I have sent one of my agents to planet Pandora," Susan was saying unnecessarily. "I'll see what she might be able to dig up on what they're doing there." Moira only paid attention with a small fraction of her processing power, still analyzing millions of other things that passed through her attention and running through potential scenerios and possibilities. "Did you get the results of Pandora Corp's latest test?"

"Yes, Susan," Moira replied. "Another failure, so they say. They have begun construction of the gateway which they had planned."

"Hmm," Susan said. "This should prove interesting. Did you come across anything else I should know about?"

"I believe that those who stole the AI parts from the Midgard Research Center may be from another dimension," Moira said.

"You sound less certain than you usually are. What's up?"

"I do not have any solid evidence that would indicate such," Moira explained. "However, I have numerous bits of data that do not add up. These people have falsified records, but strictly speaking, they do not exist. No one matching their description comes up in any file of persons of unknown whereabouts, nor even in any of the unauthorized channels. And so far as I can tell, the ship they came in on simply appeared out of nowhere."

It pained Moira to reduce things to such simple terms, without going into detail on her evidence and why she believed that, but she knew Susan prefered it that way unless specifically asked for more, and given the limitations of human speech, it was much quicker. It had taken her longer to explain it to Susan, even in brief terms, than it had for her to come to the conclusion herself.

"Do you think it might have had anything to do with Pandora's experiments?" Susan wondered.

"I have no evidence to support that conjecture," Moira said. "However, although Pandora's first experiment did not have any noticeable effect at the point of activity, this unknown vessel appears to have shown up on planet Midgard at approximately the same time as their experiment was taking place."

"Keep an eye out for any other discrepancies," Susan advised. "If something else may have appeared somewhere through their second attempt, I want to know about it as soon as possible."

"I will notify you at the soonest opportunity if I have any evidence of other events which do not add up," Moira assured her.

"If my suspicions are correct, we should be finding out soon enough."


	11. Any Port in a Storm

Jannika brought them in to dock at the ramshackle station orbitting a gas giant in an otherwise uninhabited system. The place looked as though it had been welded together from several different stations and bits of larger ships, rather than having any real design, all of it rotating somewhat haphazardly around a central pylon. She figured this was probably typical for these sorts of bases on the fringes of society, however.

"Is it safe?" Anastasia wondered, peering out at the station and voicing what Jannika was wondering herself.

"Probably not, but we don't really have much choice, do we? Just be careful, okay?"

"Is it vampire-safe?" Tasha asked, glancing off toward the system's sun on the viewscreen. The gas giant was far enough out that it was only a pinprick of light, scarsely brighter than the stars around it.

"I don't know," Jannika admitted. "But seeing as you had no problem with starlight, we might be far enough out for it to not matter. Assuming they even have many windows, anyway."

She brought in the ship and landed them in one of the station's docking bays. There were a number of other ships arranged around the place, some of them parked fairly haphazardly by those who were clearly disdainful of anything resembling parking regulations, while others on one side of the bay were all neatly arranged in perfect rows.

"Let's go see if we can find some materials," Jannika said. "Loki, hold down the ship. Notify me if you spot anyone poking around too much." She tapped her wrist-comm to make sure it was still working properly.

"Gotcha," Loki said. "Though we can probably take care of things ourselves without too many problems."

"No unnecessary chances," Jannika said firmly. "We've taken enough of them as it is." She stood up and headed for the door. "Coming, girls?"

The three of them headed out of the ship and began to explore the station a bit. The place was filthy and the lights didn't all work properly, and some of the people here looked as though they hadn't shaved in quite a while. She was used to seeing facial hair on Loki's image, of course, but seeing it on real life people, some of whom also obviously hadn't bathed in a while either, was something else entirely.

She went up to a nearby terminal, baffling at how neat and organized the systems were given the state of the station itself, and located easily enough a seller for the sorts of heavy-duty ship parts that they were going to need. Gesturing to her friends, she headed off down the corridor and down a lift, to where the seller listed could be found.

The room the terminal had indicated was full of random spare parts, some of them obviously having been salvaged from other vessels, but they looked to have been done in a clean and careful enough manner to still get the job done. The man in the shop had a close-trimmed beard and a bionic eye that flashed at the three of them when they came in. He set aside a piece of equipment he had been working on and nodded to them in greeting, giving a broad, toothy grin at them.

"Welcome, ladies, to my humble shop," he drawled. The man had a heavy accent that pointed toward his first language having been Spanish. "What can I do for you today?"

"We're looking for ship parts," Jannika said. "Do you happen to have these components on hand?" She passed over a datapad with a list of the items Loki had recommended on it.

"Hmm," said the man, perusing the list intently. "Yes, yes, I can handle all this." He pointed to one item on the list. "That part's going to cost you, however. The rest is easy enough, no questions asked, and no asking where it came from, either. But these, well, I've only got one of these, and I'm not letting it go for cheap."

"How much?" Jannika asked.

He winked at them and said, "Perhaps one of you ladies could convince me otherwise, though."

"I said, how much?" Jannika repeated more firmly.

"Three thousand total for the other bits," he said. "Twenty thousand for that one."

They didn't have that kind of money on hand. Damn Loki for always wanting obscure, expensive, or just plain dangerous to get parts, and then relying on them to pick them up. She couldn't really complain though, his designs were generally effective enough when they didn't have to cut corners.

Jannika looked aside and saw Tasha putting a hand on her shoulder. "Let me handle this," Tasha said quietly to her, and stepped forward. "I think something might be able to be arranged," she said coyly to the man, shifting her body seductively at him.

"We're able to pay eight thousand in total..." Jannika said.

"This better be good, then," the man said, grinning broadly at Tasha and clearly enjoying the view. "Don't suppose you other ladies care to join in, too? I'm sure that would much encourage the deal."

"No, thank you," Jannika said, turning away when she saw Tasha starting to caress the hairy man. She was going to perform this disgusting 'service' right in front of them? Ugh. What if somebody else walked in?

Anastasia quietly poked her after a few moments and leaned close, whispering, "It is safe to look. Really."

Tentatively, Jannika turned her head back to see what Tasha was doing, and was somewhat surprised to see that they were both fully clothed. The vampire was delicately suckling on his neck, slowly drawing out his blood in no particular hurry about it. Well, Jannika had to admit that that should be about as effective, too. After several long moments, Tasha slowly pulled away, grinning and licking her lips.

"Oh, you're good, baby," the man said. "Eight thousand sounds like a good price to me."

When Tasha went back over to her, Jannika said quietly to her with a smirk, "You are _such_ a ho."

"What?" Tasha said, looking innocent.

* * *

After hauling the necessary components back to the ship, Jannika told them, "I'm going to get to work. You two go do whatever. Just try to stay out of trouble. Keep an eye out for anything else that might be of use to us."

"Will do," Tasha said with a grin, gesturing to Anastasia to follow. Although she wasn't yet getting sick of being cooped up on the ship, she was glad enough to stretch her legs and take a better look around the place, even if it wasn't exactly the most savory place around. Thankfully, the tiny, distant sun didn't seem to have any serious adverse affects on her from out here. She was uncomfortable being near the station's windows, but it wasn't really outright painful.

"I do not particularly like this place," Anastasia murmured to her.

"It's not really my first choice for a vacation spot either," Tasha replied. "But all things considered, it's not too bad. I mean, nobody's shooting at us or anything here."

"Thank goodness for small favors," Anastasia said dryly.

They came upon a shop offering a wide variety of weapons, all of them very likely either stolen or otherwise illegal. Although she wasn't much of a fighter, Tasha would feel more comfortable with a real weapon in hand, even if it was just some sort of stunner. Vampiric reflexes and powers were one thing, but she didn't exactly have the level of super-strength that would allow hurling someone through walls or the like.

"Hmm, what do you think of this one, Nastya?" Tasha asked, holding up a stun baton that had the words 'SafeStick' in blue letters on the handle.

"It could be effective for the purpose," Anastasia said, looking it over.

"Hey, shopkeep," Tasha said, going over to the man who appeared to be in charge here. "What sort of settings does this thing have?"

"Lady wants a shock stick for self-defense does she?" the man drawled, chuckling softly.

"No, I'm planning to use it as a sex toy with my lesbian lover over there," Tasha said, voice dripping with sarcasm.

"Right," the man replied. "On the low end, you'll just get a sort of buzz out of it. The high end could knock even a big man unconscious or even cause a heart attack in someone physically frail."

"I'll take it," Tasha said with a smirk. She was glad that they'd not blown _all_ their money on the ship parts, and it was cheap enough. Hanging it from her belt, she turned around and said, "Let's go, Nastya." Then she noticed Anastasia wasn't in the shop anymore. "Nastya?" She peered about for a moment, then turned to look accusingly at the shopkeeper.

"I saw nothing," he said innocently.

Not particularly feeling like picking a fight with the owner of an illegal weapons store at the moment, Tasha just growled softly under her breath and stormed out the door, looking this way and that to see if she could spot any sign of Anastasia. She thought she saw a flash of the color of Anastasia's hair and dress momentarily before vanishing around a corner. She raced down the corridor after it, but when she got there, all she saw was a side door slamming shut with a clang.

"Damn everything," Tasha uttered, staring at the heavy metal door and wondering how she was going to get in. She tapped the wrist-comm Jannika had insisted they wear, and said, "Jannika, this is Tasha. Nastya's been kidnapped. Trace my location. Can you get this door open?"

"I'll patch you in to Loki," came the reply.

After a moment, Loki's voice announced through the wrist-comm, "I've pinpointed the room in question, but I'm afraid I can't help much. The door's a manual only, no attachment to the electronic systems."

"Damn it," Tasha said. "Any back way in?"

"Would you be averse to perpetuating a cliche?" Loki asked cheerfully. The display on the wrist device helpfully showed an overlay of the ventilation system, indicating preferred entry and exit points for getting inside the room.

Tasha smirked broadly and said, "Thanks, Loki."

She darted around down the next corridor to an unoccupied storage room with a vent in the ceiling. Quietly closing the door behind her, she went inside and poked about, then started stacking up storage crates to make a makeshift staircase to the ceiling. This would have worked out much better if she had not knocked a couple of them loose, to the muffled sounds of shattering glass.

Tasha looked at the now-sideways markings on the boxes that said 'Fragile', 'This end up', and muttered, "Oops."

Making a note to get off this station before anyone noticed, Tasha resumed stacking up boxes again until she could reach the air vent, then tried to tug it loose. It didn't budge. The vent was firmly attached to the ceiling. Swearing under her breath, Tasha proceeded to yank and tug violently on it until the grate broke off in her hands and sent her tumbling to the ground. There were further sounds of shattering glass as the crates came falling on top of her.

Stubbornly, she hurriedly stacked up the crates again and climbed into the vent shaft. She crawled along the duct until she reached the point where she was over the room in question, peering down into the ventilation grate to see what was happening in the room below. To her horror, she saw Anastasia, her clothes ripped and torn, with three men fondling her.

"Relax, chickie," one of them was saying. "We're just going to have a little fun, aren't we?"

Anastasia spat out something in Russian that sounded very impolite. Angrily, Tasha shifted around and kicked open the vent grate with both feet, dropping into the room in one fluid motion. "In English, that means 'fuck you, bastards'," she said. She pulled out her shock stick and flicked the power as high as it went, and proceeded to pummel the three men with it before they even had a chance to react.

Moments later, the hairy men were all unconscious on the floor, and Anastasia relaxed considerably and said, "My hero."

"Nobody touches my girl and gets away with it," Tasha assured her, wrapping an arm around her and giving her a kiss. "Let's get you cleaned up and back to the ship."

"Are they dead?" Anastasia wondered, looking down at the men and trying to straightened out her dress. The top of it was hopelessly torn, however, and she couldn't make it hold back in place again.

Tasha shrugged. "Haven't checked, don't care." She reached down and pulled the jacket off one of the men, and draped it around Anastasia's shoulders. "This'll work till we get back to the ship. Are you hurt?"

"Not badly, though I might wind up with some bruises," Anastasia said.

Tasha went over and opened the door and carefully led her back to the docking bay, keeping her shock stick in hand just in case anyone else decided to try anything. However, they made it back to Sleipnir without incident, and climbed aboard.

"Are you alright?" Jannika asked, poking her head down from the top of the ladder.

"Yeah," Tasha said. "Nobody got hurt too badly except some asswipes who I pummeled with this thing on max." She held up the shock baton.

"Ah, good, you picked up a weapon," Jannika said. "Be sure to charge it after."

"I'm going to get Nastya to the showers and cleaned up," Tasha said. "Get us out of here once you're done with the repairs. I don't want to stay here any longer than necessary."

"Gotcha, we'll be out of here in a jiff," Jannika replied, turning off for the bridge.

Tasha helped Anastasia into the shower room and pulled off her clothes. She'd been roughed around a bit, but aside from some scrapes and bruises, she should be alright. "You were lucky, Nastya," Tasha murmured, turning on the water.

"I know," Anastasia murmured. "I do hate to feel so helpless at times. I never saw them coming, and I was not strong enough to fight back."

Tasha removed her own clothing and tossed it aside, then pulled out the soap and began to clean her thoroughly. As she did so, the ship began to move, taking off and leaving that filthy place behind them. She didn't really care just where they might be going this time. That Anastasia was safe and well was all that really mattered.

"Maybe I can do something about that," Tasha murmured softly, gently kneading her back. "I can't be with you every moment, much as I might like to be able to. But perhaps I can give you something that would help you defend yourself if I can't be there."

"You wish to make me a vampire?" Anastasia asked.

Tasha chuckled softly. "So eager at that thought? No, that wasn't quite what I was thinking. Not just yet, anyway. But a little vampire blood regularly, and you become what's called a 'ghoul'. You'll get some of our powers, but won't be affected by the sunlight thing. You'll be stronger, and you'll have some regenerative ability, and you won't age so long as there's vampire blood in your system. How's that sound to you?"

"That..." Anastasia said. "That sounds appealing to me."

"There's just one catch," Tasha said, going to rinse some of the soap off of her. "Isn't there always? You'll be bound to me. You'll become blood bound to me, connected to me by your very soul, and you would not wish to refuse me anything I'd ask of you."

Anastasia gave a soft laugh. "You mean to tell me that this is different from how I already feel? I would do anything for you, Tasha."

Tasha grinned crookedly, and put her arms around Anastasia's waist from behind. "I just want you to be sure that this is what you really want. Because once it's fully in place, you won't want to refuse anymore. It will take three drinks before you are fully bound to me. Three drinks. Do you understand?" Anastasia nodded, and Tasha leaned close to whisper into her ear, "Do you still want this?"

"Yes, Tasha. More than anything."

"Very well, then." She brought her own wrist to her mouth and bit it. "Then drink."

Without hesitation, Anastasia almost eagerly took to suckling the blood from Tasha's wrist, naked and trembling softly on the shower room floor. Tasha might be almost a little worried about just how eager she seemed, but she trusted Anastasia completely and would happily give _her_ anything she asked for as well. Not that she had any intention of making her a vampire anytime soon, even if she asked, though. For one thing, despite being universes away, she was still somewhat scared of what Alistair might do if he found out about it. Well, time enough to deal with that issue.

After several long moments, Tasha drew her wrist away from Anastasia and healed up the wound in her wrist. "Thank you, Tasha," Anastasia murmured.

"Don't know how long you'll be thanking me for," Tasha said with a smirk. "But that'll be for you to decide. Come on, let's get you dried off and dressed."

* * *

Jannika glanced over at the bridge door when Tasha and Anastasia came through. "Hey," she said. "Everything okay?" The swirling brightness of hyperspace filled the screen.

"Yeah," Tasha said. She had her arm around Anastasia's waist, and the other was leaning against her casually. "So what's our next stop?"

"Next system over," Jannika said. "I'd _like_ to get us to planet Pandora to steal that warp coil from them, but like hell do I think we're ready to pull something like that just yet."

"So what's the plan?" Tasha wondered. "Just wander around aimlessly until someone kills us?" She smirked broadly.

"I'm open for suggestions," Jannika said, shrugging helplessly. "I hadn't exactly planned on any of this, and at the time I was more interested in getting out of there, given your urgency at the time."

"We're going to need resources," Tasha said. "Weapons, equipment, allies. Someone actually experienced in breaking into places they aren't supposed to be would be a plus. For the right price, you can find someone that's willing to do anything for you, and that price isn't always money, although trying to scrounge up some credits wouldn't be a terrible idea either."

"Buying weapons, hiring mercenaries?" Jannika said thoughtfully. "We're definitely going to need some money."

Tasha nodded. "Well, we've got a ship, and very probably the fastest ship in the galaxy. If we're not willing to share that technology for money, then why not use it for money? We could do some trading, move resources from one planet to another for a profit, legal ones or otherwise."

"There's an idea," Jannika said. "The folks on Midgard will remember us, but Loki says that he's intercepted and misdirected the warrants they attempted to send out elsewhere about us. For the moment at least, nobody outside the Midgard system should know about us yet. That'll at least give us some breathing room for now."

"That's good," Tasha said, nodding. "Okay, I suppose one of you can draw up the data and flight plans necessary to make the most money through trading as quickly as possible. Staying on the legal side of the fence would be a plus, but not necessary."

Loki, sitting on the console beside Jannika, piped up helpfully, "I will draw up the requested data at the soonest convenience and arrange for a course."

"Excellent," Tasha said with a grin. "Carry on, then. We're going to get some sleep."

"But you don't actually need--" Jannika began, then stopped and cleared her throat. "Right, never mind. Sleep well." Shaking her head and rolling her eyes faintly as they went, she turned her attention back to the console. She still wasn't quite used to the shameless public displays of affection from those two, and their complete lack of subtlety in some areas at times.

Momentarily, Loki brought up a helpful chart on the screen indicating supply and demand for various resources on a number of nearby systems. "Here is the requested information. Which of these options would you prefer at the moment?"

Jannika glanced over the data displayed thoughtfully. "Here," she said, pointing. "Planet Svartheim. We can get a commission for shipping tenebrite ore."

"An excellent option for staying out of further trouble for the time being," Loki replied. "You should also get some sleep while we're on the way there. With or without a day and night cycle aboard the ship, your body still needs a certain amount of rest every so often."

"Yes, Loki, I know," Jannika said with a grin. "What are you, my mother?"

"Nah, I'm more responsible than her. Shoo, shoo. Off to bed."

Jannika laughed lightly and patted the top of the screen before heading off to sleep.


	12. Space Vikings

Jannika was woken by the sounds of alarm klaxons. "What's going on this time?" she grumbled. There was no way that they could be at their destination yet.

"We have hit a hyperspace net," Sleipnir's voice came over the comm. "Hyperspace movement has halted."

"A what?" Tasha said, frowning deeply as she got dressed and headed for the bridge.

As she went, Sleipnir explained, "A hyperspace net is a large device strung through hyperspace, similar in function to large drift nets used for fishing and frequently used by space pirates. A ship caught up in a hyperspace net will be unable to move or flee unless it manages to disentangle itself from the net or otherwise cut itself loose, and will send an alert to the ones who placed the net, letting them know that something has tripped it."

"Thank you for that enlightening info dump, Sleipnir," Jannika said groggily.

"What's going on?" Tasha said, arriving on the bridge with Anastasia.

"Hyperspace net," Jannika said. "We have to cut ourselves loose before whoever set it gets here, or we're going nowhere."

"You are not sending me out to cut that thing loose," Tasha replied with a smirk.

"Hey, hey, I wasn't even thinking of that!" Jannika said innocently. "I'm going to have to see if the ship's arms will be able to get the job done, though. Really don't want us winding up the catch of the day for some enterprising pirates."

Carefully, Jannika maneuvered the ship's arms to cut away at part of the net surrounding them. However, due to their speed when they struck the net, they were well and truly tangled into it, and the thing was almost invisible against the background of hyperspace. It blew her mind just how big this thing likely was to have any reliable chance of catching anyone passing through hyperspace. Was the cost of the net really worth the value of anything they might catch? She assumed so, or they'd not bother even using the things.

After several hours of work and them still partially entangled in the net, Anastasia returned to the bridge and said quietly, "Jannika..."

"What?" Jannika said, glancing up. She'd become so embroiled in the careful work that she'd failed to paying attention to other things.

Anastasia pointed at the sensor readout. "Something is approaching us."

Tasha looked over at the display. "One ship," she said. "Medium-sized craft, from the looks of things. The pirates returning to retrieve their prize?"

"Already? Helvíti..." Jannika said. "Seems like every bit I cut free of this net, we just turn and tangle up again in another part. Damn. I knew I should have tried to find another way, but I didn't think they'd be appearing so soon. They must have already been somewhere nearby."

Feeling like a sitting duck in the water, Jannika stared at the screen as the pirate vessel came up next to them, avoiding getting tangled in the next itself, and extended large arms to cut them loose and pull them into its cargo hold. Large metal restraints clamped around the ship to hold it in place.

"Great, now what do we do?" Jannika said dejectedly as the cargo hold doors slammed shut around them.

Tasha pulled out her shock stick and hefted it thoughtfully and said, "Talking them out of doing anything untoward probably wouldn't work. Trying to beat the crap out of every pirate on this ship would probably be suicide. Option C, of course, is to take over the ship."

"Their systems are too well shielded for me to break into from here," Loki said. "You would need to get me to their main control room."

"Tasha, the ship doesn't have artificial gravity," Jannika reminded her. "I don't know about you, but _I_ certainly don't have much experience with working in zero-G."

Tasha shook her head. "We'll just have to make do. You carry Loki. Anastasia, you might want to stay here. You don't have a weapon."

"Jannika lacks a weapon also," Anastasia pointed out. "But we can take the first ones which we come across and be of assistance nonetheless."

"Fine," Tasha said. "Come on."

"They're outside," Loki said. "Twelve of them, preparing to come in."

They went down to the ship's hatch, taking position in the entryway where they couldn't be easily seen or shot at from outside, and braced themselves against the ladder and anything else nearby. They waited a couple minutes before the door opened and a short, muscular bearded man wearing a horned helmet stepped inside, then immediately dropped to the floor when he hit the gravity field. Tasha smacked him on the back of the neck with her shock stick. Anastasia yanked the helmet off his head, and Jannika reached over to try to snag his sidearm. She didn't quite manage to grab it as a burst of light plasma shot past her head and mildly scorched the wall beyond. A moment later she tried again and managed to snatch it up and duck out of the way.

"We have you surrounded and outnumbered," a gruff voice outside called to them. "Surrender now and you will not be harmed."

"What, so you can sell us on the slave market or something?" Jannika called out. "We don't even have any cargo!"

"The cargo hold," Tasha whispered, and Jannika nodded and the two of them moved back to the door leading into the cargo hold.

Sure enough, the side door opened momentarily and two more dwarven Vikings were standing in it, thinking to get the drop on them from the side. Anastasia, swinging the helmet like a weapon, managed to almost impale one of them, and Jannika winged the second in the shoulder with her blazer pistol. He fired back, sending Anastasia tumbling to the ground, clutching a burnt shoulder.

Two more dwarves appeared in the front hatch, and three more in the cargo hold. There was no way they could hold all of them off. Heart racing, Jannika pressed herself against the wall next to the doorway. She was no trained fighter and barely knew how to fire a gun, for Odin's sake!

With two blazer pistols pointed at her face, Tasha dropped her shock baton and said, "Don't shoot. I surrender."

Jannika sighed, although she couldn't blame her, and dropped her blazer, then raised her hands above her head. "We surrender."

"Come on out of there quietly now, come on," said their leader.

The dwarves roughly brought them outside into zero-G. One of them said, "Sir, their ship has artificial gravity!"

"Does it now?" the leader said. "Very interesting. And I'm sure you ladies are going to tell us all about it. You've got spirit, but I'd hope you're not stupid, hmm?"

The dwarven Vikings took away Loki and led the three of them off to a row of tiny cells, and locked them up inside. They were tight little compartments without much room to move, but at least they included a zero-G bathroom in a nook in the back.

Jannika sighed and floated against the wall, and muttered, "I hate zero-G."

"I'm sorry," Tasha said. "The way they were shooting around fire like that..."

"It's okay," Jannika assured her, shaking her head. "I knew it was a hopeless case in the first place. It's my fault for not getting us out of the net fast enough."

"Relax," Anastasia said. "It is not anyone's fault. We could not have anticipated this turn of events."

Jannika nodded faintly. "They know how to fight in zero-G. We don't. They had weapons. We didn't really. The main question is, what are we going to do _now_?"

One of the dwarves floated down the hallway outside their cells and grabbed onto the cell bars. "Well, well, I hope you ladies are comfortable in there," he said, chuckling darkly. "I am Barin Warphammer, the captain of this vessel. What do you say we have a little chat, hmm?"

"What do you want with us, Captain?" Jannika asked.

"Well, now. We were thinking of taking you back to planet Svartheim and selling you on the slave block, and then disassembling your ship and sending it off to our scientists to reverse-engineer and figure out how you got artificial gravity on such a small ship. But maybe you can convince me otherwise, hmm?"

"There's really no need for this," Jannika said, snorting softly. "You know, we were _going_ to planet Svartheim in the first place."

"Were you now?" the captain said. "And just what were you planning on doing there?"

"Trading," Jannika said.

"But your ship had no cargo. Why were you running empty?"

"Didn't have time for it," Jannika explained. "We were on the run from the authorities and were looking for a safe place to land for a bit."

"Captain Warphammer," Anastasia put in. "Would it not serve us both better if we were to work together as allies rather than as enemies? There is much benefit you could gain from us, without the unfortunate necessity of analyzing our ship or attempting to find a way to force us to talk."

Barin Warphammer stroked at his long, black beard with his free hand. "Perhaps, perhaps. Keep talking, girl."

"We have access to far more than merely artificial gravity," Anastasia said. "You see, we have acquired technology at least five hundred years more advanced than anything used in this galaxy, including engines at least ten times faster than those you use and replicators which can produce all the food and drink you would want."

Captain Warphammer looked in with interest. "Now you're really talking. Serious? If this is true, why did you not take it to the black market or to Pandora Corp? You could've made a fortune."

"Would you have?" Anastasia asked.

"No," he replied. "I'd keep that sort of thing for my own advantage. You have a point."

"Yes, imagine the advantage that could give you. And who else would have to find out about it if you had to rely upon your scientists back on Svartheim to discover how it might work, not to mention how long it might take them to reverse engineer the technology. It might take them years, if not decades, assuming they could figure out how it worked at all. On the other hand, if you let us work with you instead, you could have the fastest pirate ship in the galaxy within a matter of weeks."

"Vikings," Warphammer said. "We're Vikings, not pirates."

"Yes, Vikings," Anastasia corrected herself. "But yes. Do you not think that would be worth keeping that advantage for yourself?"

"It's an intriguing proposal. But how do I know this isn't some sort of trick?"

Anastasia smiled faintly. "We are not precisely in the best bargaining position here, would you say? We would not even demand what these benefits would be honestly worth. We only wish to be set free."

"Which one if you is the engineer?" Warphammer asked.

"I am," Jannika said.

"Very well. You and the blonde can go back to your ship. You will make preparations for what will be needed to give my ship a few upgrades. That one," he pointed to Tasha, "will come back with me to my quarters and remain there. To ensure your good behavior."

"Right..." Jannika said, really not liking the sounds of that, but in no position to argue at the moment.

Tasha was dragged off down the corridor to the captain's quarters, while Jannika and Anastasia were more-or-less politely escorted back to their ship and deposited there, leaving a pair of guards outside just in case they decided to try to do anything stupid. As grateful as she was to return to normal gravity, she was more than a little worried about things, and found herself pacing nervously.

"Jannika, relax," Anastasia assured her, putting an arm on her shoulder and stopping her from continuing to pace. "We merely need to deliver what we are able to them, or at the very least, behave as though we are going to while stalling for a better solution."

"Yeah, but how am I going to even do that without Loki? I have barely a clue how any of this stuff even works, and I have no idea where they got him off to!"

Sighing, Jannika climbed up the ladder to the bridge and tried to locate Loki. Wherever they might have taken him, she figured she should be able to contact him and get a lock on his position, hopefully. However, try as she might, Sleipnir could not get a lock on him or contact him in any way. That was not a good sign. They must have taken him into some sort of shielded area. Or the cargo hold that they were stuck in was shielded. That would make sense. Either way, however, it wasn't much help for her at the moment. She couldn't hope that they would conveniently manage to take him someplace that he could actually cause any serious trouble for them.

She went down the ladder again and opened the main hatch. The guards outside lifted their weapons warily, but she raised her hands to indicate she wasn't going to do anything silly. "Excuse me, I don't mean to cause any trouble, but someone appears to have taken my laptop. I won't be able to do what is asked of me without it, I'm afraid."

"Back inside," the guard said.

"But--"

"I said back inside." He aimed his sidearm at her pointedly.

"Yes, sir," she said sheepishly, stepping back into the ship and closing the door behind her.

So much for that idea. She figured she'd have to do this the hard way. Jannika returned to the bridge again and brought up what data Sleipnir had available, trying to extrapolate it by hand just what would be needed to install their type of engines on a ship this size. She had to wonder what the point of it all was, however, as there was no chance in hell they'd have the luminite crystals available to even power the things. If nothing else, however, she couldn't complain about Anastasia managing to talk their way out of the cells, even if it put Tasha in a potentially uncomfortable position.

* * *

Tasha found herself tied up to one wall of the captain's quarters. This situation was just going from bad to worse in her opinion. She had to find some way out of this before they got to planet Svartheim and unknowingly dragged her outside into sunlight. No matter what she had to do to wriggle her way out of the situation.

Captain Warphammer returned to his quarters after a wait of perhaps half an hour, and grinned over at her. "Well, hello there, little lady. So nice of you to join me. What might I be calling you?"

"Tasha," she replied, thinking quietly to herself that she might be able to work with this.

"Well now, Tasha, I imagine you must be fairly uncomfortable in those ropes, hmm?" He drifted over toward her and grabbed onto a bar overhead. "Would you like a chance to get rid of them?"

"If it would please you, Captain," Tasha replied demurely.

Warphammer chuckled deeply. "So rich. If your friends don't follow through, I think I'll just keep you for myself."

Tasha didn't bother answering that one way or another. He reached over and grabbed onto her clothes with both hands, caressing her and fondling her shamelessly. After several long moments of that, he finally decided to reach over and untie the bonds around her wrists and ankles, if only to make it easier to pull off her clothes. She didn't like it, but if this would keep him happy and keep the three of them alive and well, she'd happily take whatever opportunity she got.

The only thing she really had to wonder was how she was ever going to find his neck underneath all the hair.

* * *

Jannika paced across the bridge, frustrated and reaching the end of her rope. The Vikings refused to return Loki, and she'd decided it was probably best not to push the issue too much. She had no way without him of acceeding to their demands in any way she thought would actually satisfy them. And they were running short on time and patience.

A communication came in from the captain. It was in video, so she put it on the main viewscreen. She was horrified to see Tasha stretched out in the background on ropes from the ceiling to floor, completely naked, although had to be thankful that the scary, ugly dwarf had at least put on clothes.

"Well, well. You've been given three days. Do you have any progress to show for it?" he asked.

"I need more time," Jannika replied. "This isn't a simple matter. I need to calculate the energy requirements for the ship's size, determine the necessary propulsion equivalencies, estimate the resources which will be needed to construct the new engines..."

"More time, you say," Captain Warphammer said.

"Yes," Jannika said. "Since your men took my laptop, I've had to do everything manually, which has necessitated it taking longer."

"I think you just need a little motivation," Warphammer said, pulling out a short leather whip for her inspect. "You know, it takes a lot of practice to learn how to properly use one of these in zero-G, but it's well worth it."

Jannika found herself unable to do anything but protest wordlessly and helplessly as Captain Warphammer viciously flogged Tasha before her eyes. Eight lashes, nine, and then ten, and he was done, leaving Tasha whimpering quietly in her restraints. Grinning broadly as though he had enjoyed that entirely too much, Captain Warphammer returned to the forefront of the screen, licking his lips a bit.

"Now. I hope you're sufficiently motivated to bring me results, and soon. If not, I'm sure your friend wouldn't mind being further abuesd. I have so many interesting things in mind which I might do with her."

"I will bring you results," Jannika promised quietly.

"Good," Warphammer said, and the viewscreen went blank.

"Damn it all," Jannika murmured, sinking back into her seat with a heavy sigh. She was glad Anastasia hadn't been on the bridge to see that.

Jannika finally wound up deciding to try to deliver some sort of schematic for an engine system for them, even one that would be completely implausible to manage with their current power technology. At least it might buy them some time and spare Tasha some pain and humiliation. She realized that even in the short time he had been reactivated, she had become too reliant on Loki again despite her own abilities. She had all the necessary information here, after all, and she was perfectly capable of doing this on her own, wasn't she? She could only hope that there weren't any engineers aboard the ship skilled enough to realize that the new propulsion system could never work without a new power source as well.

It was almost a full day later before she managed to pull together a proper schematic for the engines, and sent it off to Captain Warphammer. With a sigh, she slid down in her seat and rubbed her eyes wearily.

"Jannika?" Anastasia said, strolling onto the bridge. "Are you alright? You have not slept in almost two days."

"No time to sleep. He'll hurt Tasha if I don't give them results, and I gave him results. I can only hope that he'll be satisfied with that, but I still doubt he'll let Tasha go yet..."

"Come on, Jannika." Anastasia gently touched her shoulder. "You should get some sleep. You will be able to produce far better results if you are thinking properly and well-rested. We will yet be able to save Tasha. And ourselves."

Jannika sighed loudly. "You're right, Nastya. I'm just so worried about everything that I don't know if I even _could_ sleep."

"You will be fine. Come, now."

Jannika let herself be dragged off the bridge, almost falling down the ladder into the lower deck from her tiredness, and stumbled into her quarters. Although she hadn't really thought she could sleep, she was out the moment her head hit the pillow, without even bothering to undress herself first.

* * *

"Captain Warphammer," Jannika said over the comm. "I've delivered the schematics for the engine design that you requested. Will you please release Tasha now?"

"Nope," Warphammer replied, absently fondling Tasha on the viewscreen, prompting Jannika to look away in disgust. "You will deliver the information for your artificial gravity and replicators also. If you do this before we reach the Svartheim system in two weeks, your friend will be released and you will be allowed to go. Maybe." He grinned toothily. "Maybe I'll just feel like keeping her instead, hmm? I'm finding I rather enjoy her. You're going to have to give me a very convincing reason to give her up, now, aren't you."

"Yes, Captain Warphammer," Jannika said dejectedly, and the screen went off.

Anastasia came onto the bridge, quietly munching on a strudel. Jannika had to wonder just how she could eat at a time like this. "What is the latest news? Is he not releasing Tasha as of yet?"

"No," Jannika said, shaking her head. "He wants the other technology you promised him. The artificial gravity and the replicators. I don't even _know_ how those work! I might be able to swing the gravity panels, but the replicators, not a chance in hell."

"They do not necessarily know that whatever schematics which you give them may not function properly," Anastasia pointed out. "They will not have the time to properly test them out before reaching their destination, and even then they will take time to make work. Also, even if you did give them a functional replicator schematic, they would not be able to make it function regardless, due to the lack of a proper power source."

"You have a point," Jannika admitted. "I'll have do to the best I can, and if they realize it doesn't work, and I'm still around to ask about it, I'll claim that they just did it wrong or something. But I'm damned well going to give them _something_."

Anastasia poked her gently and told her, "You also really need to eat something. You have been neglecting your body, and it will begin to protest soon if you do not give it something."

"Just replicate a power bar and bring it to me, then," Jannika said, shaking her head. "I've got too much work to do and I'd never be able to eat a real meal."

"Very well. I worry about you, you know."

Jannika sighed again as Anastasia went back to the mess hall, and she started to get to work on the designs for the artificial gravity system. She knew how the panels worked, more or less, sure. They'd had to construct several of them for the use in Sleipnir. But it was still fairly esoteric to her understanding. Some of the technology Tasha had brought with her may as well be magic for all she could truly understand how and why it worked.

"Here, Jannika," Anastasia returned and walked up behind her. "Eat this, please?" She offered Jannika a half-unwrapped brown bar in a foil wrapper. Jannika reluctantly took it and took a bite. Mm, pepperoni flavor.

"So what have you been doing all this time I've been working, anyway?" Jannika wondered, glancing up from her work long enough to chew on the food bar.

"I have been speaking with Sleipnir," Anastasia explained. "Loki said that he would only achieve full sentience if given proper care and attention, so I have been attempting to give him that. I would so hate for him to be ignored and get lonely."

"It'll still probably take years, anyway, though," Jannika said, shrugging and taking another big bite of the bar. She'd been hungrier than she'd thought.

"Yes, but regardless, that will take longer or shorter if he's ignored or cared for, to my understanding. And I have little better to do at the moment as I cannot help with your ship design issues. The best I could hope for is in speaking with our captors, and there is little I can yet do in that regard that I have not already done."

Jannika finished up the food and tossed the wrapper back at her. "Alright, alright. Do what you like. Just please try to stay out of my space too much. This is going to take all the attention I can give it to make it work."

Anastasia bent down to pick up the wrapper off the floor. "Very well, Jannika. I will leave you be. But only if you promise to remember to eat and sleep sufficiently to keep your strength and mental capacity on full, alright?"

"I promise," Jannika assured her.

Anastasia nodded in satisfaction and graciously turned and left her to her work. Although she knew that without the power source, none of this was likely to actually work, she could at least give them something that looked like it was going to work. But they'd need to get planetside again and get the resources to build it and test it. That much would at least buy them some more time. She just had to hope that they'd be satisfied with the schematics and wouldn't then force them to build it for them. At least they might have a better chance of escaping once planetside, with any luck.

In the weeks that followed, Jannika finished up the designs for the gravity and replicator systems and sent them off to Captain Warphammer. He occasionally felt like punctuating her work day with displays of various things he was doing to Tasha, as 'motivation' for her to work well. Tasha really didn't look like she was much enjoying this unwelcome attention, even when she played along with it. Jannika was sickened and disgusted by it all, and after the last such display, felt like she might need to head back to the bathroom and vomit.

Finally, Sleipnir's readings told them they'd dropped out of hyperspace. They'd reached the Svartheim system.


	13. Dwarf Fortress

Tasha need not have worried about the sunlight issue. When they arrived on planet Svartheim, they discovered that the entire colony was subterranean, far from the barely-habitable surface. The Viking ship landed in an enormous docking cavern with vast bay doors high above.

"You said you were going to let us go," Tasha said quietly to Captain Warphammer. "We've done all that you asked of us. Please let us go."

Captain Warphammer just grinned broadly at her and shook his head. "Not just yet, I think. There's just a few more things that I want of you lovely ladies first."

"What more do you want, Captain Warphammer?" Tasha asked. "What else might please you?"

Several dwarven Vikings standing around them poked at Tasha unpleasantly and guffawed. The captain licked his lips and said, "I want you to make me a vampire."

Tasha blinked in surprise, and the other Vikings roared in amusement at her expense. She hadn't realized that they'd even known vampires existed. Was there such a thing in this universe, then? Were there vampires even on planet Svartheim as well?

"Don't look so surprised, Tasha," Captain Warphammer drawled. "Did you think that I was so blind as to fail to notice it? The way you nipped at my blood, but took no other food or signs of going hungry despite being locked in my quarters for two weeks? Don't take me for a fool. Your secret is out, and I want it."

Maybe they didn't know about them after all, Tasha thought. Beyond the obvious folklore, anyway. "Yes, Captain Warphammer," she murmured. Perhaps it was a good time to bluff her way out of this.

"Excellent," Warphammer said, grinning at her wickedly. The sadistic man was far too eager for this. She hated to see what he might do if she actually gave him vampiric powers, just what sort of abuses he might find to do with them. She had no intention of actually giving him that gift, however.

"You'll need to untie me to perform the ritual, though," Tasha said. "And there are things which your crew will need to assist with."

"Very well." Captain Warphammer reached over and undid her bonds, releasing her, then turned aside to his men and said, "Do whatever she tells you to do, you got it?"

"Yes, sir," said the dwarves.

Now it was time to improvise. "Tell me, firstly, how many moons does Svartheim have, and what are the time cycles of them?"

"Three moons," Warphammer replied. "One large one with a month of forty days, and two smaller subordinate ones that are faster. Why?"

"The power of the vampire is tied into the night. It would not do to perform this ritual only to fail due to a miscalculation on the celestial side. Who is your second in command?"

Captain Warphammer pointed to a black-bearded dwarf on his left. "Durgan Blackblade is my second."

Tasha nodded. "Blackblade, sir, I will need you and some of your crew to acquire thirteen black candles for the use in the ritual. Can you do that?"

"Can do," Durgan Blackblade replied, nodding to some of the other dwarves and gesturing at them to follow.

Captain Warphammer asked, "Are there any other preparations which need to be taken?"

"You'll need a coffin, of course," Tasha said. "It must be made of ash wood and filled with the dirt of your homeland." She had to keep herself from grinning. She was enjoying running them around in circles far too much.

"Ash wood?" Captain Warphammer repeated. "We don't exactly have a lot of wood around here, and I'd never be able to recognize a specific type of wood if my life depended upon it."

"Nonetheless, the coffin must be made of wood," Tasha said. "Other types may be an acceptable substitute if ash cannot be found, but you may be weaker than if you used an ash wood coffin."

"Fine," Captain Warhammer said, turning aside to his crew members. "Fine me a wooden coffin somewhere. And you two, bring in a couple bags of dirt."

A few more of the dwarves ran off to try to cover these errands as well. Tasha quietly wondered to herself just what more of this she'd be able to get away with, as well as if enough of the Vikings were out of the ship running around to give her friends a chance to take advantage of the situation...

* * *

Once they landed but had not yet been released as promised, Jannika realized that they'd have to take matters into their own hands, but would hopefully stand a better chance of it now. With any luck, the majority of the crew would be planetside and have left only a skeleton crew behind to guard the ship.

"Nastya," Jannika said to her quietly. "Now's our chance. Think we can manage it?"

"There are probably still guards outside," Anastasia commented. "And we as yet lack weapons. They took from us those we had managed to acquire."

"How about the replicator?" Jannika said. "We can replicate something simple, like clubs, and take the guards by surprise and then take _their_ weapons."

"We would _need_ the element of surprise to take on armed and experienced Vikings wielding better weapons than us," Anastasia said.

"I don't think they realize there's an upper hatch, too," Jannika commented. "We could climb up there and drop something down on top of them."

"I think that would have a far better chance of success than an outright confrontation."

Jannika headed to the replicator and conjured up a pair of clubs, as well as a couple long knives for them. She handed Anastasia her weapons and tucked a knife into her belt. Then she pulled out from the replicator a large pot full of boiling oil. As Jannika gingerly took it and carried it toward the door, Anastasia followed her lead and replicated a second bowl of it herself. They headed up toward the ladder for the top hatch, setting the implements on the floor temporarily, and tried to open it as quietly as possible. Once it was open, Jannika poked her head out cautiously and took a look around.

There were two dwarves still stationed at the main hatch into Sleipnir. They didn't appear to have noticed or heard anything from the top of the ship. Jannika nodded down at Anastasia and they carefully passed the two bowls up, very gently so as not to inadvertently spill any on themselves. Then the two of them edged to the side of the ship and poured the scalding contents of the bowls onto the dwarves below.

Jannika slid down the ladder again and grabbed her club, then opened the door to the front hatch, followed shortly by Anastasia. The dwarves were in pain and still very disoriented, and a swing of Jannika's club knocked the blazer out of one's hand with a sickening crunch. Anastasia slipped on the oil on the floor and went tumbling to the ground, tangled up in her dress. Jannika grabbed the fallen blazer and turned it on the guards, and managed to down them after several shots at close range, although taking a burn of her own on her arm in the process.

"Nastya, are you alright?" Jannika asked, snatching the second guard's blazer and going over to where Anastasia had fallen.

"I am unhurt, I believe," Anastasia said. Jannika offered her the blazer, and she took it. "Where do you think we might find Loki?"

"I don't know, but I've set my wrist-comm to beep and open a channel to him if it gets somewhere that it can do so. Hopefully there aren't too many more dwarves wandering the ship. Be on alert. And we'd best also turn our blazers up to high. Don't want to be having to shoot them multiple times if we can help it. Just make sure not to point it in the general direction of anyone friendly."

"I understand," Anastasia said, peering at the blazer for a moment. "How do you use one?"

"Ugh," Jannika said, making a face. Of course she wouldn't know how to use one. Even Jannika had only the most basic, intuitive knowledge of it. "Setting is adjusted with that dial there. Then point it at what you want dead and push the trigger-button on the bottom. Did they not even have basic projectile weapons on your world?"

"Yes, but I never used one," Anastasia replied.

"We'll just have to make do. Just remember, don't point it at me!"

Anastasia nodded, and Jannika headed off out of the cargo bay. Thankfully, there didn't seem to be many dwarves still wandering the corridors. They must be all off getting drunk planetside or restocking their supplies and making preparations to put Jannika's schematics to not-so-good use. Jannika grew more and more nervous as they wandered the narrow corridors, surprising and dispatching the occasional dwarf, without any sign of Loki. Finally, much to her relief, her wrist-comm beeped at her.

"Jannika!" Loki's voice said through it. "So good to contact you again."

"Loki! Where are you?" Jannika asked.

"I've been taken off the ship by some grubby-handed Viking-wannabe." The watch display switched to an overview of the area around Loki, a rough map of the tunnels in their part of the city.

"Crap," Jannika said. "Hold tight, Loki. We're coming for you."

They found they weren't far from one of the hatches leading out of the ship, the only reason they'd managed to establish a link to Loki from here, and went and opened it up. The dimly lit cavern outside was wide open and filled with numerous other ships. Off to the left, Jannika spotted in the distance Tasha speaking with Captain Warphammer, with several of the other dwarves around. They didn't appear to have spotted the two of them.

"There's too many of them to try to rescue Tasha right now," Jannika whispered to Anastasia. "We'll need to try to sneak around and retrieve Loki first. I hope she can keep them busy long enough."

Darting between the other, smaller ships and using them as cover, Jannika and Anastasia snuck to the edge of the subterranean landing area, following the map which Loki had provided. The colony on Svartheim was a complex tangle of underground tunnels arranged in a manner that probably made some sense to the dwarves who had originally carved them out from the black stone. Most of the walls were elaborately carved with stone murals depicting dwarves, weapons, mythological figures, and spaceships.

Thankfully, the dwarves outside the docking area hadn't gotten the memo that a couple human women shouldn't be running around, and pretty much ignored them to continue their work hauling rocks from one part of the fortress to another. They passed doorways leading into a number of storerooms holding crates upon crates of stone blocks, then some other storerooms holding piles upon piles of rough stones, some with metal bars, and some with stone crafts of various sorts.

"How are you doing, Loki?" Jannika asked quietly into her wrist-comm as she continued down the corridor.

"Hurry, please, if you can," Loki said. "I am in grave danger. Oh, this is horrible, horrible I say!"

Jannika glanced aside to Anastasia, raising an eyebrow at Loki's tone, and said, "Alright, we're on our way, we're almost there."

They went down a flight of stone steps and down another corridor into a housing area. The map indicated that Loki was in the residence on the right-hand side. Carefully, Jannika crept up to the doorway and eased it open, peering inside. On the floor in the center of the room, she saw Loki, being manhandled and drooled over by a fat, ugly, bearded dwarf toddler. She didn't see anyone else in the immediate vicinity.

Jannika stepped inside and said quietly, "Excuse me, kid, but that's _my_ toy." She snatched Loki out of his hands, causing the dwarven child to bawl loudly, and headed for the door.

"Oh, thank you, Jannika," Loki said to her. "You've saved me! Ugh. I am going to need a thorough cleaning after that."

"Yeah, well, we still need to get out of here with Tasha." She headed back toward the docking area, on the lookout for any of the Vikings spotting her along the way.

They reached the end of the tunnel and peered into the landing cave. "What is Tasha doing?" Anastasia wondered softly.

"Looks like some sort of bizarre ritual," Jannika murmured. "Whatever she's doing, let's hope she keeps doing it a bit longer. Loki, can you access the Viking ship's controls from here, or do you still need to get into the control room?"

"Need to get to the control room. From the looks of things, Tasha has most of the ship's crew busy here with whatever she's doing."

"Let's take advantage of it while we can," Jannika said, going to sneak across the landing cave again back to the larger Viking ship. Once at the hatch again, she murmured to Loki, "Can you get me anything on the layout of the ship at least?"

The watch brought up a rough map of the ship. "Best I can do, I'm afraid. I _think_ that the control room must be over here." An area flashed red on the map. "If only because of its positioning and the fact that I can't scan it."

"Then that's where we'll go."

Blazer in one hand and drool-dripping Loki in the other, Jannika crept down the deserted corridors toward the marked room on the map. When they reached it without further incident, Jannika poked absently at the door panel beside the sliding doors, directing Anastasia to stand ready on the left side of the door and herself positioned on the right to shoot anything that might be inside. Loki managed to activate the door panel and get the door open.

The two women fired blindly into the room, then Jannika cautiously peered inside. She almost got her head taken off by a plasma bolt for her trouble from a dwarf hiding behind a console. Anastasia fired at him and managed to score a hit. Swearing in Icelandic could be heard from inside the chamber. Jannika fired some more in its general direction, darting into the room and ducking behind something herself. More plasma shots came out, one of them searing her in the shin. Jannika yelped and yanked her leg back.

Anastasia ran into the door and darted around the opposite side of the room, and managing to scramble up behind the remaining dwarf and fry him at close range.

"Room is clear," Loki announced. "Repeat, the room is clear."

"They didn't get a message off to the ones outside, did they?" Jannika asked, rising to her feet and looking around at the slightly scorched room.

"No," Loki said. "You kind of shot out the communications console."

Jannika smirked. "Can you get Sleipnir free?"

"Already on it. Almost got it... there. I've also set it so I can remotely open the cargo bay doors when we're ready to get out of here. I've also made sure not to leave any record on their computers of the engineering schematics you gave them."

"Great," Jannika said. "Let's go see if we can get Tasha and get the hell out of here."

* * *

The dwarven Vikings had managed to collect the items Tasha had demanded for the 'ritual', and gathered around with them. She looked over the items disdainfully and said, "These are crude, but they will suffice."

"Dwarves are unparalleled artisans with stone, lady, not wood," one of the Vikings put in.

"Have each of you hold a candle and light them, and stand in a circle around me and the captain," Tasha directed them. "Empty the soil into the coffin and place it in the center of the circle as well."

The dwarves did as directed, and Captain Warphammer, still grinning in an evil, eager manner, stood next to the coffin waiting for her. "If all is in order, then, begin the ritual, my dear Tasha."

"Very well," Tasha said, looking around appraisingly at the dwarves who were gathered around. "You must chant something for me, do you think you can do that? Repeat these words: Diabolus noctus libero minimus. Say it."

"Diabolus noctus libero minimus," repeated the dwarves in sync.

"Keep repeating that until I raise my hand above my head," Tasha said.

"Diabolus noctus libero minimus," chanted the circle.

"Now, Captain Warphammer, your neck, if you please."

Warphammer nodded, and pulled aside his beard and extended his neck for her. Tasha leaned close and began to drain the blood from his body, slowly drawing out his lifeblood into herself. She was quite glad to have a chance to actually get some blood into her after the little she was able to take in captivity. Gradually, his heartbeat began to slow and his breathing grew fainter, until it finally stopped. Solemnly, Tasha took the dwarf's body and laid it among the dirt inside the coffin, then raised a fist above her head to signal the chanting to stop.

"On the third turning of the great moon, he will rise from his grave and walk the galaxy as a mighty creature of the night," Tasha told them.

"You've done it, then?" Blackblade said, coming up beside her to look into the coffin.

"It is done," Tasha said, inclining her head solemnly.

"Good," Blackblade said, then pulled out a wooden stake from his coat and plunged it into Warphammer's chest. Laughing darkly, he turned to the circle of Vikings and said, "Captain Warphammer will never rise! I'm your captain now! To me, my brethren!"

Blackblade drew out another stake and tried to stab Tasha with it, but her quick reflexes allowed her to duck aside and avoid the attack. That didn't help the fact that she'd now found herself surrounded by a number of irate dwarves intent upon blood. They began to draw knives and axes from their belts.

Just as she as beginning to panic, Tasha heard a rumbling sound from somewhere nearby, and saw several heavy metal-laden mine carts rolling their way just in time to leap out of the way and on top of one of them as it went crashing through Warphammer's coffin, splinters flying everywhere. Most of the Vikings were bowled over in the sudden assault, and Tasha found herself clinging to the top of a wildly moving cart for dear life.

The mine carts crashed into the side of the Viking ship with such a force that Tasha was flung backwards and into the ground nearby, a couple metal bars landing on top of her. The bay doors on the ship slowly began to open on their own, and out of the corner of her eye, she saw Jannika and Anastasia running across the landing area toward her.

"Tasha!" Jannika said. "Are you okay?"

"Yeah, I'll be fine," Tasha said. "Fortuitous timing there."

"What was it they were chanting, anyway?" Jannika wondered.

"Very bad Latin?" Anastasia replied with a crooked grin.

Sleipnir eased out of the cargo bay and set itself down on the floor nearby. Jannika said, "Let's shove a few of these mine carts into the cargo bay and get out of here. No sense leaving here empty handed." She grinned.

Tasha realized that they were _powered_ mine carts -- No wonder they'd been able to build up such a speed and been able to so accurately flatten the congregation of dwarves. They got three of the carts into the cargo hold and sealed the doors shut behind them, then headed to the bridge.

Jannika settled into the pilot's seat and brought them to take off. "Loki, can you convince those doors up top to let us out?"

"Will do, Jannika."

As they ascended up the subterranean shaft, at first Tasha didn't think they were going to manage to get away, as the doors didn't open immediately, but as they got close, finally the doors started sliding open slowly, dim light pouring in from outside. The surface of Svartheim wasn't particularly bright and clear, either. Clouds of roiling black smoke blotted out the stars, and the wan sun did little more than leave even daytime in a state of perpetual twilight.

"Is anyone coming for us or trying to stop us?" Tasha wondered.

"Negative," Loki said.

"And hopefully the thrusters won't rip a hole in the ass of the ship this time," Jannika said. "I'm taking it a bit easier on them with the heavy cargo, but with any luck, my repairs will hold."

They didn't fully relax, however, until they had cleared the atmosphere and escaped into hyperspace. It seemed that if anyone had figured out what had gone on down there, they didn't care what happened to the Vikings anyway.

"Let's come up with some way to detect those damned nets. I don't want another repeat of that incident," Jannika said bitterly.

"We can probably swing that," Loki said. "But first, would you mind cleaning me off, please?"


	14. Titanium Fist

Jannika was glad to be in hyperspace again and given a chance to relax and recover from her wounds, and Sleipnir estimated that with the new hyperspace scanning routines, they should be able to detect and automatically avert any further potential unfortunate incidents, with any luck. Jannika hadn't realized that there were so many dangers even in relatively innocuous parts of the galaxy.

Tasha had made her the same offer that she'd made to Anastasia: to become a ghoul, a little vampire blood from time to time to gain a portion of the vampire's powers. Before the business with the Vikings, she would have had to give some serious thinking to the matter before wanting to take her up on the matter, but now things were different and she had a rather more realistic view of the universe. She was willing to take any advantage she could get, and she trusted Tasha implicitly.

They had set course for a peaceful-sounding planet called Idyll, where she hoped to sell their cargo for a fine profit and take a much-needed breather from all the excitement and stress.

"So, planet Idyll," Tasha mused, leaning back in a seat in the mess hall as the others ate. "What's it like?"

"So far as I can tell from the internet," Jannika replied, munching on a hunk of garlic bread, "it's one of those utopian colonies set up as an attempt to actually make communism work. Again. I don't know how successful they've been, but from the sounds of things, there haven't been any serious problems there lately, and they'd put out a request for resources on the internet. Like metal ore. I don't know what they want all the metal for, but if the price is right, we could sure as hell use the money."

"Certainly beats the crap we've been putting up with lately, from the sounds of things," Tasha said, shaking her head slowly.

"Hey," Jannika said gently. "Are you sure you're okay? Warphammer did some horrible things to you..."

"I said I'll be fine," Tasha said, snorting softly. "I sure as hell didn't enjoy it, but I got back at him for it all in the end. Yeah, I'm not generally one to resort to petty vengeance, but sometimes, some people really _need_ to be stopped in any way possible. I'm not sorry about killing him."

"You mean, that funky ritual you performed wasn't really how someone becomes a vampire?" Jannika wondered.

Tasha laughed bitterly. "No, no, of course not. It's not nearly that complicated. I was giving them the whole runaround to give you and Anastasia some time to come up with a way to get us the hell out of there. Black candles, ash wood coffins, hah! Vampires don't need all these silly trappings."

"Well, great work on that, because it certainly worked well enough," Jannika said. "They were all busy attending the ritual and hardly anyone was left watching the ship."

Anastasia murmured quietly, "I was worried about you, Tasha."

Tasha smiled warmly at her and got up to circle around her and rub her shoulders gently. "Relax, Nastya. That's what you always say, isn't it? He didn't do any permanent physical harm. And mentally, well, I can deal with that. Okay?"

"Alright," Anastasia said, smiling faintly.

Perhaps not entirely surprisingly, planet Idyll didn't turn out to be quite so idyllic looking as they might have hoped. The only places on the planet that were still halfway green and verdant were the ones on the far side of the planet on another continent from the main colony. Sprawling miles of factories, blocks of apartments lined up in neat rows, supply depots, cafeterias, and other buildings made up the gray and dismal colony city. It wasn't so much that they didn't attempt to paint the buildings white and pretty for the pictures, but that the smoke from the inefficient factories made sure every paint job turned into gray after a few years.

Although the place wasn't a pleasant place for a vacation, at least it seemed safe enough for the moment, and Jannika went over and landed them near the coordinates of a place that had been requesting shipments of metal. She headed outside along with Tasha and Anatasia to a building nearby to negotiate prices.

There was a woman working at a terminal on a desk inside late in the evening, who looked up at them as they came in. "Please tell me you're here with the ore."

Jannika chuckled softly. "You're in luck. Our ship outside is loaded up with three cartloads of tenebrite bars, fresh from Svartheim."

"Tenebrite?" the woman repeated. "That'll do nicely. Let's see how much of it you've got and I'll name you a price." Her English was spoken with more of a British sort of accent than the galactic standard American one.

They led the woman back out to Sleipnir and opened the doors to the cargo bay, and let her scan over the cartloads of tenebrite. "Hmm. A nice amount of it here. I'll give you forty-eight thousand for the load. Will that be enough?"

"That'll be fine," Jannika said. "Where shall we put them?"

"This warehouse over here," she said.

She helped them bring out the carts and take them over to the indicated building. Once the carts were in place, they went back to the office and received their payment. Jannika felt a good deal more comfortable with a fair chunk of money under their belt, no matter what they'd had to go through to get it, and was just glad that the woman hadn't bothered to ask any questions about the shipment.

"Planning on staying on planet Idyll for a bit?"

"Perhaps," Tasha said. "It doesn't really live up to its name though, does it?"

"Not particularly, no. My name's Labor, by the way."

"That's a strange name," Tasha said.

"Is it?" Labor said with a faint smirk. "It's a pretty common one around here. Well, if you don't have any other plans lined up, you can come over to the place I live in and meet my brother, Peon. He loves meeting offworlders."

"Sure," Tasha said with a grin, glancing to Jannika and Anastasia. "We wouldn't mind at all, would we guys?"

"Not at all," Jannika replied with a chuckle. "And I'd also love to find out why your names are Labor and Peon. Did you have very sadistic parents or something?"

Labor looked confused. "What would our parents have anything to do with it? We were named by Hera, like everyone else."

"Who is Hera?" Tasha asked.

"The AI who is in charge of this colony, of course," Labor said. "By her wisdom, all this was built." Jannika found it difficult to tell whether she was being sarcastic about that statement or not.

Labor's shift ended in half an hour, and when it did, the four of them climbed into Sleipnir and flew over to park in an open area near a large residential complex. They had not seen any individual homes anywhere in this part of the colony, or if they had, they weren't even recognizable as such from a distance.

"Quite a lovely vessel you have here," Labor said as they climbed out. "It definitely beats taking the airbus."

She led them into the nearby domicile. The place was cramped and filthy, and looked as though twice the comfortable number of people had been packed into it, at the least. Labor didn't seem to be particularly bothered by it, though, but Anastasia was positively repulsed and looked as though she was going to puke.

"Peon!" Labor called out. "I have some offworlders here to meet you!"

A scraggly young man poked his head out of one of the side rooms and gave a broad grin. Although he appeared to be making an attempt to keep clean-shaven, his whiskers appeared to be trying to protest, especially at the rushed and careless job he seemed to have done that left a half-healed nicks on his face. He rushed out to go to shake their hands, self-consciously wiping off his fingers on his shirt first. Anastasia declined to return the handshake.

"Greetings, greetings!" Peon said excitedly. "Always a pleasure to meet offworlders. Would you like something to eat or drink? I don't have much to offer, but it never pays to be inhospitable."

"Actually," Anastasia put in, "if you would not mind or consider it to be an affront, you are welcome to come aboard our vessel and speak instead. We have plenty of food and beverages available."

"Oh, I would hate to be an intrusion or go around eating up all your food or anything," Peon said.

"It's not an imposition, really," Jannika said with a grin. "And I'd love to see you _try_ to eat up all of our food." She glanced aside at a couple of young teenagers, filthy and malnourished, looking up at them almost pleadingly. "And you're more than welcome to bring back all the leftovers you can carry, too," she added with a small smile toward them.

"Well, if you insist," Peon acquiesced. "Lead the way, then."

They led him back out of the little domicile and out to Sleipnir again. He started in awe and wonderment at the ship, despite it not exactly having anything obvious at a glance that was particularly unusual about it. Just the fact that it was a clean and whole actual spacefaring vessel seemed amazing to him. He was almost in stunned disbelief when he saw the replicator demonstrated, however.

"This little box," he said, staring in awe, "really makes food out of thin air?"

He was almost too in shock to take the plate of pasta Jannika offered him, but finally realized she was holding it in front of his face, and took the thing and sat down to begin to eat hungrily. Jannika didn't care to explain what little she understood about the physics of the thing, about how it reassembled molecules taken apart by the recycler in an esoteric manner.

"Effectively, yes," Jannika said.

"This is incredible!" Peon said. "This could change our world forever! This could end hunger across the planet!"

Jannika had never really given much thought before into just who this sort of technology could really benefit, if it could get into the right hands and stay there, but she still had no confidence in either the government or Pandora Corp to put it to good use. The people on planet Idyll lived terribly, and it disgusted her. But her pessimistic views led her only to imagining unpleasant consequences to and attempt to make that state better with mere technology. The problems here went more deeply than that.

Anastasia sat down across from him and said gently, "Excuse me, Mr. Peon, but I and my friends are strangers to your world, and we know nothing of the happenings here. Could you perhaps be so kind as to tell us a bit about the place?"

"Oh, of course," Peon said between bites. "I know you probably don't know anything about this planet besides what propoganda has been put out. Technically, I'm not even supposed to be speaking with you, as it's not to do with my job. Though, I suppose, if any of you are Supers, you're allowed to do whatever you want, including talk to whoever you want, anyway."

"We all are Class-S," Anastasia replied. "Why would you not be allowed to speak with us?"

"That's a relief. We Norms, I'm afraid, are not allowed to do much outside our area of work. We're even assigned specific so-called entertainment films to watch. They're all propaganda films created by Hera, of course. They're also all quite terrible. Some of us have managed to get bootleg films and books down here, but they're few and far between."

"Hera is the AI who runs this planet?" Jannika mused aloud. "Just what sort of AI _is_ this thing, anyway? And why is she allowed to get away with this crap?"

"I'm sorry, I'm afraid I don't know much of the history of the planet or how it came to be in this state," Peon said. "We only learn what Hera teaches us, and she hasn't seen fit to teach us much in the way of history."

"Excuse me," came Loki's voice from the colored box. "If I may be of service? I believe I can deliver a succinct history lesson."

"Oh, of course. Let's just call you Mr. Exposition, then," Jannika said, placing the box on the table and opening him up.

Loki's screen began to display with relevant images, maps, and video clips as he talked, his voice imitating that of a stereotypical announcer. "Two hundred years ago, planet Idyll was colonized by a group of enterprising people intent upon making a perfect, utopian civilization. As they knew from previous experience on Earth that no human being is immune to corruption, they decided to place an artificial intelligence in the position of administration of the planet instead. Heuristic Engineering Resource Administrator, or HERA for short, was everything they had hoped for. Or so they thought at first."

Video clips showed on the screen, news reports of riots, and then video records of mass executions. Peon stared at the screen, dropping his fork from a limp hand in shock. "Wh-- When did this happen?"

"Two separate incidents in the last century," Loki replied, going on. "Reports were suppressed, and all evidence of the massacres was covered up. Hera prevented access to the internet to anyone but herself, and stopped the news from reaching the galaxy at large. I, of course, managed to quietly hack into her secret files and discover precisely what she was hiding."

"Wouldn't she find out about this, and be angry?" Peon said nervously.

"I doubt it," Loki replied offhandedly. "I also have some evidence that there's another rebellion brewing at the moment. Hera has no idea where they are based, of course, otherwise she'd have quashed them by now."

Peon nodded eagerly. "Yes, I've had some contact with the ones who wish to oppose Vera's rule, but I did not realize that they had yet done anything much beyond deliver things to us which we were not meant to have."

"Oh, from the sounds of things, they're not only organized, but heavily armed as well," Loki said. "Hera controls the entire surface of this continent, and can't find them anywhere here, so logically, they're either underground or on the other continent. And while the latter would certainly work for security, they wouldn't be able to interact with the populace here so much if they did, therefore, I'm betting they're underground."

"In the old mines?" Peon said, his face lighting up. "This is wonderful news! I would so dearly love to meet them. I know it is much to ask of strangers, but would you ladies be willing to help us free our planet of Vera's rule?"

"Most definitely," Jannika said. Tasha and Anastasia seemed a bit more cautious on the matter, but they also nodded in agreement after a moment.

"Very well," Loki said. "I will attempt to provide what information I can, but the rebels have been very cautious about using anything which could be monitored, so I cannot readily pinpoint their locations either."

"We should probably leave Sleipnir somewhere inconspicuous, like a loading area for exports," Tasha said. "We were planning on picking up some trade commodities for when we leave the planet, so why don't we arrange for that now and proceed on foot from there?"

"Good idea," Jannika said. "At least that way if we need to make a sudden escape, at least we'll have something to sell at the next stop for our trouble."

Loki helpfully brought up a map on his screen with a recommended location, and Jannika smirked broadly. She'd figured he'd have a helpful suggestion for that as well. She headed over to the bridge and flew them over to that location, and landed. Jannika headed into the office briefly to put in the order before rejoining them again.

Just in case, they brought out the pair of blazers they had acquired on planet Svartheim, and equipped Jannika and Tasha with them, as they were the most capable of using them less badly than the others. More knives were replicated and given to everyone. Packs with food were also replicated, as well as a couple ropes. Peon was suitably impressed at the replicator's capabilities.

Tasha glanced about at the dismal Idyllic night and said, "Okay, so, where's the nearest entrance to these mines you mentioned?"

The map on Loki's screen shifted to include a map of the city with a location highlighted in red upon it. The three women and Peon headed off down the neatly arrayed streets to the location in question. The place was absolutely still and silent aside from the distant thrum of machinery at work. Few lights were on, and very few people could be seen moving about in the city itself. Loki's map wound up leading them to what appeared to be a large medical facility.

"Loki, are you sure this is the right place?" Jannika asked.

"Absolutely," Loki said.

Peon added, "I bet the building was built right on top of the old mine entrance. We'll probably find it in the basement."

"Why would they do that?" Tasha wondered, raising an eyebrow as they headed toward the hospital doors.

Anastasia suggested, "Perhaps Hera did not wish to disrupt her neatly designed city layout with such trivialities of the location of natural resources?"

"Sounds about right," Peon said dryly.

Inside the lobby of the medical facility, there was a young woman working at the desk, and no sign of anyone else in the immediate vicinity. The place was only slightly cleaner than the locations they had seen elsewhere in the city, and seemed to be only a concession to the weakness of human beings and the requirement of their occasional maintainance. The desk girl looked up at them as they entered, disinterested after a quick glance showed that nobody was in immediate danger of keeping over.

"May I help you with something?" she asked.

Anastasia stepped forward and took on an imperious stance and tone, and said, "No, we do not require assistance at this time. We merely need to take a look around. We are not actually here. Understand?"

The woman immediately grew very nervous, and looked away, promptly finding her terminal to be extremely fascinating. "I see nothing."

Anastasia nodded in terse satisfaction and headed off down a random corridor, shortly finding stairs leading down to the basement and heading downstairs, the others following her lead with a touch of confusion.

"How did you know what to say to her?" Peon asked quietly, raising an eyebrow. "I was sure she wouldn't let us in, or tag us for violating curfew without cause!"

"She does this all the time," Jannika said dryly, smirking.

Anastasia glanced around the basement, looking for a light switch, and explained, "It is often a good rule of thumb to act as though you belong in a place, especially if you do not. From Vera's history, I surmised that she has a habit of attempting to keep things quiet and suppress dissent, and she cannot do this all herself. Unless I miss my guess, that secretary will not breathe a word that she has seen anything out of the ordinary."

"Brilliant," Peon said.

"Did anyone think to bring a flashlight?" Jannika said dryly.

"Here's a torch," Peon said, pulling up a flashlight and flicking it on. "There's a rack of them here."

They each took up a flashlight and began to explore the basement in hopes of finding this old mine entrance Loki had promised was supposed to be here. In the far corner of the place, the floor began to be more broken and crumbling, and in places it was possible to slip through underneath the floor entirely. Shining their lights into the holes indicated that there appeared to be tunnels of some sort down below the hospital. Tentatively, they crawled underneath the floor and into the tunnels.

"Nastya," Jannika commented. "Why do you insist on wearing a dress even for things like this?"

"Why should I not?" Anastasia said, raising an eyebrow back at her.

"Isn't it difficult to climb around in that thing? Doesn't it get caught on everything and trip you up more often than not?"

"Not particularly," Anastasia said with a shrug.

Down through the tunnels they crawled, and were able to stand more easily at a spot where the mine entrance had not so blatantly been covered up and built over. There were few old, forgotten signs of mining work that could be seen any longer, and the place has become a haven for a variety of subterranean wildlife that shied away from their lights. Spots of graffiti could also be seen here and there along the walls, some of it more fresh than others.

"So, any idea just what we might be looking for here?" Jannika wondered.

Peon paused at a graffito and looked over it thoughtfully. "Hmm. I've seen this symbol before on bootleg packages." He indicated where an 'at' sign had been scrawled in black on a nearby wall, a partly circled lowercase a.

"Couldn't hurt to check out," Tasha said. "It seems to indicate the left-hand passage here."

Quietly they crept along the left-hand passage, winding along deeper into the ground below the surface, and came across another at sign long past most of the more fresh graffiti. They turned in the direction the symbol seemed to indicate, heading down further and further under the ground into the winding tunnels, some of which looked as though they might have originated in part as natural tunnels before ore had been discovered here.

Then finally, somewhere ahead, they heard voices in the caverns, and went quiet to listen for a moment. They hadn't been particularly stealthy, however, and the voices went quiet as well, followed by the shuffling of feet. Several dirty, unkempt people with guns came around the corner in front of them, and others could be heard closing them in quickly from behind as well.

"This is our place," said one of them. "Identify yourselves."

"Wait, Job," said another one. "I know that man! That's Peon of District Epsilon."

The man addressed as Job slowly lowered his weapon and directed the others to do the same. "Well, Peon is it? Nice of you to join us. Who are your friends?"

"They're offworlders," Peon said, and pointed to each of them in introduction. "Anastasia, Tasha, and Jannika. We've come to help. We also brought food and supplies."

"Can always use a hand around here," Job said. "Come on, I'll show you in. Supplies are definitely welcome at this point too."

Job led them further into the caves, where a flickering fire lit a subterranean encampment of ramshackle hammocks and cots. The places was populated with unwashed people who hadn't really shaved in a fair while, however all of them were equipped with some sort of weapon or another, even a few of them who appeared to be no older than ten years old. The four of them pulled the packs off their backs and brought out the food they'd brought along. For the sake of space for value, they'd opted for the replicator's formula for space rations, which, while they weren't particularly tasty, they had a very high nutrition value for a small amount of them.

"Take care with these rations," Tasha advised. "They don't look like much, but each of those little cubes will last an active adult for a full day."

That got people's attention, and they crowded around the newcomers as though they'd come in bringing gold and sparkling gems. Job brought them to order, and they carefully distributed the precious food and carried most of it off for storage. Jannika couldn't help but smile softly to herself at the sight of these people, for the first time in however long, seeing some glimmer of hope for a better life in such a small gesture.

"Thank you so much," Job said to them. "You have no idea what this means to us. We've been able to smuggle in weapons, but we've had less luck getting our hands on solid, long-lasting food. Weapons last a long time, but we've had to get more and more food in here constantly, and we're afraid Vera's going to notice where it's disappearing to before long. If you need weapons of any sort, please help yourself to our cache. We have more of them than people to wield them."

"That would be great," Jannika said. "If necessary, we can bring in more of these rations, too. Personally, I'd love to get this Hera issue taken care of once and for all, however."

They headed over to the weapons cavern they were directed to, and found the place to be extraordinarily well-stocked. There were stun sticks, projectile weapons of many types, blazers of different sizes, and micro-grenades. This would all be very helpful in taking down Hera, if they could get to where she was and put them to good use. Unfortunately, none of the four of them really knew how to use them very well, although she was certain that some of the rebels were more skilled and experienced with these sorts of weapons.

"I hate to interrupt this gratuitous wall of weapons," Loki put in, "but the cops are investigating Sleipnir. It seems Hera was alerted to my probing. Shall I direct him to wait for us in space?"

"Helvíti," Jannika muttered. "Yeah, send him out to the outer system or something and hide. Hera might have something that could reach him in orbit. Did they manage to get the goods loaded onto him first?"

"Affirmative," Loki said. "Thankfully, the investigation appears to be merely routine. For all her attempts at stopping rumors from spreading, I doubt I am the only one to have broken into her systems. With any luck, they won't be able to trace us down here."

After finishing gathering up a selection of weapons, Jannika headed back to Job and said, "While we're willing to help, none of us really knows much about weapons or combat, I'm afraid. If it's not too much to ask, do you have anyone that could give us a bit of instruction, maybe?"

"Yes, of course," Job said, then glanced at Loki, noticing the open screen, and said in shock, "Wait! You've brought a computer down here? What have you done, we're done for!"

"Relax," Loki said. "I am a fully sentient AI, and I assure you that should Hera detect my presense, I will know about it immediately and be able to notify you. She will not, however, be able to obtain any information through me, regardless."

Job relaxed a bit at the reassurance and said, "I hope you're right, because if this place gets stormed because of you, I'll kill you all myself." He sighed softly and glanced away, and said, "Go ask Hercules for instruction." He pointed vaguely and walked off.

"I say," Loki replied after he was gone. "I don't believe that the fellow likes me overmuch."

"Come on," Jannika said to the others. "Let's go find this Hercules."


	15. Shattered Chains

They spent the next several days in the caves below the city, learning about combat and the use of weapons from Hercules so that they might actually stand a chance of hitting their intended target rather than the walls, their friends, or shooting themselves in the feet. There were a number of non-lethal practice guns around that were shaped like their deadly versions and were set up to simulate how they'd handle and kick when actually fired.

Hercules was a big, burly man with a nasty scar across his face, and none of them wanted to readily cross him. Although he shaved once in a while, he frequently went around with his shirt open so that it was plainly obvious he did not attempt to shave his chest as well.

"You there!" he shouted at Tasha. "Keep your arms up! You can't fire a gun if you're afraid the enemy will smell your B.O.! And _you_ ," he directed to Anastasia, "Flimsy blonde chick! Do you really think you're going to fight in a dress? Put some trousers on already, girl!"

"I am perfectly capable of functioning while wearing a dress," Anastasia replied irritably.

Reluctantly, she finally wound up making a concession to the situation by splitting her dress and sewing it up the middle into pant-like legs, after Hercules demonstrated painfully what sort of advantage could be taken over an opponent wearing a dress. Although he had similar things to say about hair, neither she nor Tasha were inclined to crop their hair short.

"So, Tasha," Jannika wondered to her quietly when that was brought up. "If you cut your hair, would it stay short forever, or would it like, grow back immediately or something?"

"I'm not sure," Tasha replied. "I never really cared to try it."

A week after their arrival, they spoke with Job and the other rebel leaders on the matter of taking care of Hera once and for all. They were all eager to make a decisive strike and bring about a new era of freedom to planet Idyll, but understandably more than a little cautious about the matter.

"We need to make sure we can even get in," Job said. "Hera's positioned in the heart of the administration complex. That place is full of guards, as well as automated security systems, and very probably even has cameras."

"Cameras?" Jannika said in surprise. "She can get away with that?"

"She doesn't see any need to try it outside the complex, but in there, you're in _her_ world. Nobody can tell the almighty Hera what to do inside _her_ place. I'm sure she'd love to eventually get that sort of control over the entire planet. And she probably will manage it sooner or later if she's not stopped here and now."

Loki piped in, "I may be able to assist with obtaining passage into the complex. Going up against another AI is always a tricky prospect, however, with one in control of so large a facility, I may be able to temporarily override her control over the doors, weapons, and other systems."

"That just may be enough to give us the chance we need," Job said.

"Once inside, I can download a map of the complex to tell us where we will need to go," Loki went on.

Jannika nodded faintly, and commented, "Somehow, I doubt it's going to be as easy as just walk in, plant some explosives, walk out again, and set them off. For one thing, you'll have to use the very simple sorts of explosives you've got stored around here, or she'd just be able to disable them again. And those sorts of things can't be triggered remotely."

"We'll have to set a timer," Job said. "Give us enough time to get everyone out, hopefully before any of her agents walk in and disable the things manually."

Hercules put in grimly, "Remember, the people you are going up against have been trained almost since birth to fight for and protect Hera. You have not. Some of you didn't know your gun from your arse a week or two ago. Most of them are fanatical and will not surrender and give no quarter. If you want to succeed, you're going to need to play dirty and exploit their weaknesses. Some of us _will_ die, there's no two ways about that. We must all be prepared to give our lives for the sake of the cause."

Job added, "So long as Hera is destroyed, our deaths will not be in vain. They may forget our names, but our brothers and sisters and children and their children and their children's children will live free."

The dirty, betrodden people ate up his inspirational charisma like flowers turning to sunlight to open and bloom. They needed something to believe in, some hope for a future for the people of Idyll, and Job gave that to them in full measure. Jannika could well believe that each and every one of these people would have gladly laid down their lives for him at that moment.

"We will come in in a three-pronged attack," Job said. "A team from one of the building's side entrances, and two from below. Loki and the offworlders will go with the first group and try to hack through Hera's defenses. The other two teams will try to get in through the mines, sewers, and basement, and provide something else for Hera and her guards to think about. Regardless of what happens to the other teams, someone needs to make into Hera's core chamber and plant those explosives, and make sure that she is destroyed, at any cost."

"How will the teams be able to coordinate with one another?" Jannika wondered. "How will they know when it's time to get out, or be able to warn one another if anything unexpected happens, as it inevitably will?"

"We can't afford to use any sort of communications devices that Hera could track or take over," Job said.

"What about these watches?" Jannika held up her wrist, raising an eyebrow.

"We can't use them. I'm surprised that Hera has not brought down her elites down upon us already, if those are more than simple time-pieces."

Loki spoke up again, sounding a little weary of this already, "I assure you, Job, I have complete control over those wrist communication devices. Hera may be able to eavesdrop from time to time, but no more than she'd be able to anywhere else in the facility, which probably has microphones all over the place."

"You know," someone pointed out. "We're putting an awful lot of faith into something that looks like one of my baby sister's toys."

"Would you trust me more if I painted myself black with a yellow at sign on my top?" Loki said dryly. "Honestly now."

"I'd have thought an AI would be opposed to destroying another one of its kind," someone else put in.

"Are you opposed to killing humans just because they're human?" Loki pointed out. "Especially if they've been brainwashed since birth, or have become so psychotic and ill in the mind that that's the only resort you have to take in order to protect yourselves and others?"

There was some grumbling, but Job stilled it with a raised hand. "No more of this. We will follow the toddler toy and listen to his advice." He gave Loki such a look that said quite clearly if he gave _any_ reason to distrust him, that Job was likely to open him up and rip out his computer guts bit by bit.

The rebels split up into teams and equipped themselves, arming up with an array of weapons. Job directed the young, the old, and the wounded to stay behind here, and assigned a team of armed and healthy adults to watch over them. Tasha and Anastasia handed over their watch-comms to Job and Hercules, the leaders of the other two teams. Peon and five others were joining their team in addition to Loki and the three women.

During the day, the three teams travelled through the mine tunnels underneath the city. Each team leader was given a packet of rations of carry along for the mission, and distribute as needed. Survivors were given instructions to split up into the mines after fleeing the administration center to avoid pursuit, if there were any survivors at least. Jannika had some trouble keeping Tasha moving. It wasn't easy for the vampire to stay on her feet during the day, and she really didn't like it, but there wasn't really much other choice if they were going to get into position before sunset.

"I don't know why you're always so tired during the day when planetside, but you're just fine in space," Jannika muttered. "Can't you just like, pretend you're in space or something? We're half a kilometer underground here!"

Tasha just grunted and continued trudging through the tunnels, not even bothering to reply. Jannika could tell that Tasha and Anastasia were not too keen on the idea of dying for the sake of strangers, and personally, she fully intended to try to get out of this alive, whether it was the 'right thing to do' or not.

Finally, as they approached their destination, Tasha glanced up at the ceiling and murmured, "The sun is setting."

"Remarkable," Jannika replied with a smirk. "And you didn't even need a watch to tell you that, either."

"I really didn't care to get caught in the sun inadvertently," Tasha said.

Peon poked his head up and asked, "Did I miss something?"

"Um," Tasha said. "I'm gene-modded to be stronger and faster than a normal human, but sunlight is bad for me. Really bad. Gives me a really nasty sunburn and all."

"Oh, I see," Peon said. "Good to know."

Jannika smirked faintly to herself, and decided that this probably wasn't the time or the place to ask if Karzan's vampires really _were_ genetically modified or whether it was just something entirely supernatural. They'd reached the tunnel leading up to the surface again and were heading up through it. The other teams would continue underground on separate paths, but they'd need to take the much more dangerous approach from the surface. She could only hope that Loki really was up to it.

The old mine tunnel came out underneath a quiet warehouse, which they crept out and headed outside into the dreary Idyllic night. The multi-storey administration complex looked like a dark tower against the shadowed sky. Loki brought up a map on his screen to direct them to the side entrance they were trying to head in at, and they diligently followed it.

A delivery entrance, probably used for bringing supplies and components into the center. The nine of them clustered up around it, peering this way and that to ensure that no one had spotted them, but the dusky streets appeared deserted tonight, and the only people that could be seen far down the streets in the distance didn't appear to be paying much attention to them.

Jannika tapped her wrist-comm and quietly said into it, "The apples are in the fruit stand."

A few moments later, Job's voice came through with the reply, "The bread is in the bakery."

Then Hercules's voice added, "The cheese is in the dairy."

"Time to eat," Job commanded.

"Your cue, Loki," Jannika said quietly, grinning back at the colorful laptop tucked away in her backpack.

"On it," Loki said brightly. The door before them clicked quietly, then slid open. "Go, go, go!"

The nine of them slipped in through the entrance, which Loki slid shut behind them. Jannika glanced at her watch, seeing that Loki had now brought up a map of the building, figuring that he probably sent it to the other teams as well. There weren't any guards visible in the immediate vicinity, but she had to assume that if they hadn't yet been alerted to their presense, they would be very soon.

Jannika led the way down the corridor in hopes of getting to the elevator. According to Loki's map, Hera's core facilities were located on the top floor. She really doubted it was going to be as easy as just taking the elevator up, however, and her fears were proven correct when an alarm klaxon sounded throughout the facility, red lights flashing and cameras watching them move.

"Yeah, screw you too," Jannika said, taking out a couple cameras as target practice with her plasma rifle.

She heard footsteps from the corridor to the left, and ducked back against a wall. Plasma fire streamed in from the guards' weapons, scorching one of the rebels' badly on the left side. The team fired back from cover and managed to take out the three guards. Peon was obviously scared out of his wits, trembling in terror and barely being useful in the fight.

Jannika turned back and leaned down to the wounded rebel. "Are you okay?"

The man was scorched heavily, and one of his eyes had melted out of its socket. "Leave me," he said. "Complete the mission!"

"There's more guards coming," Tasha said.

"Get moving," said the wounded rebel. "I'll keep them busy so long as I'm still conscious."

Jannika hated to leave somebody behind like that, but she had to concede to the practicality of the situation. She nodded reluctantly and gestured to the others, leading them quickly down the corridor. Behind them, the sounds of plasma weapons going off could be heard, and the wounded man was yelling insults at the guards.

Jannika tapped the wrist device and said, "An apple has fallen off the cart."

They managed to make it to the elevator past another group of guards firing at them. The remaining team members ducked inside, and fired back some shots before Loki got the doors closed. Slowly the elevator began to rise, taking them up several floors, until it ground to a sudden halt, then went up a bit further, then down again, then up again, until it screeched to a halt and the doors opened with a swish.

"Out. Now," Loki said. "She's interfering with me."

The team scrambled out of the elevator hastily, and the last member had scarsely cleared it before the doors snapped shut again and the elevator dropped. A quick look around revealed that they were in what appeared to be a staff dining area, as clean and sterile as the rest of the facility. The number beside the elevator indicated that they were three floors from Hera still.

"We'll just have to take the stairs the rest of the way," Jannika commented, then tapped her watch-comm and said, "Apple pie in the sky."

"This code is making me hungry," commented Hercules over the comm.

Jannika glanced around at the others and said, "Wait, where's Peon?" They hadn't seen where he might have disappeared or wandered off to. "Damn. No time to look for him now. Let's go."

Around the corner and up the stairs, Jannika heard a beeping sound coming from above and raised a hand to halt the others. Loki confirmed that there was a weapons system in the room, and after a few moments of hacking, he set the weapons to firing at one another until it was safe to pass. They went up and climbed up toward the next staircase.

"Hold on a moment," Jannika murmured, peering up the next set of stairs. "I've got a bad feeling about this."

There was black smoke up at the top of the stairs, and the loud sound of clanging and clanking as something very large and heavy moved around. Through the smoke, a figure trundled into view. It was an enormous robot, too large to fit into the narrow stairwell, but it didn't have to. With an ominous beep and a red laser sight, it aimed what looked like a very lethal weapon down at them.

"Hit the deck!" Jannika cried, leaping for cover behind a desk.

The team scrambled for cover as the robot fired a rocket into the room. Fire and shrapnel flew everywhere, showering anyone unwary enough not to have gotten behind cover. One of the group members hadn't managed to move out of the way in time and now lay as a blackened corpse in the center of the room.

"Loki, can you shut it down?" Jannika asked frantically.

"No can do," Loki replied. "Sorry. Hera's controlling it directly."

"Helvíti," Jannika swore.

Between shots, she jumped out and popped off several plasma shots at the machine, but didn't seem to even make a dent in it. The robot prepared to fire again, and she took cover, heart racing as she barely made it and some bits of metal embedded themselves into her arm.

"Apple pie in the fucking oven," Jannika snapped off into her comm.

There was the sound of clanking again as the robot moved, stomping away from the top of the stairs again. "It's gone," said one of the rebels. "We're safe for the moment. It can't come down the stairs, right?" She looked ominously toward the elevator, from which loud noises were coming, and added nervously, "Uh, right?"

"Cover!" Jannika cried, ducking behind the metal desk again.

The elevator doors opened and the robot immediately fired off a robot into the room, sending shattering objects flying everywhere again. Jannika set aside her plasma rifle and pulled out an old-style slug pistol, and popped off a few ineffectual shots at the robot. The other team members were pelting it with whatever they had as well, and not to particularly great effect.

"Sandwiches coming right up," said Hercules's voice from her wrist-comm.

The robot seemed like it was getting fairly annoyed at Jannika, and clanked over to her, reaching out with its thick arms and yanking the desk out of the way. Jannika cried out in fright and tumbled out between its legs, almost getting stomped on in the process. As it turned toward her, from behind it, Tasha leaped out from the side and onto its back. The robot stopped for a moment, then flailed about, trying to shake her off. Tasha jammed her knife into its back panel, after a couple of stabs managing to pry it loose. The robot managed to knock Tasha loose, but a large sheet of its back armor came tearing off with her.

As the robot began to turn its attention toward Jannika again, the elevator dinged, and Hercules stepped out and aimed a huge gun at the robot's back and fired, and then again. Pieces of robot went flying as the shots penetrated the vulnerable back parts, until it stopped moving in numerous still-smoking pieces.

Jannika climbed to her feet again and looked over at Hercules and the other rebels who had filed out of the elevator behind him. "How did you get up the elevator? Hera had it locked down."

"We didn't have any trouble with the lift," Hercules said.

"Her attention was fully on the robot," Loki said. "I took advantage of the situation to bring them up."

She noticed that some of their team members were missing also. "How many casualties?"

"Five between bread and cheese," Hercules said grimly. "Including Job, I'm afraid. We left three behind guarding the bottom of the lift and stairs also."

"Let's get moving," Jannika said with a slight nod. "We're only two floors from Hera."

Hercules reloaded his big gun, and the combined group headed up the stairs, past the scorched walls and shattered furniture that the robot had turned into a miniature warzone. At the final flight of stairs, Jannika stared nervously up toward the top, wondering just what horrors might await them at the end.

Hercules gently pushed her aside. "Allow me, kid. I've waited a long time for this." Shouldering his enormous gun, he strode purposefully up the stairs at the head of the group.

The others tentatively began to file up in line behind him, wary of another abomination of metal and weaponry coming to attack them. There were more automated weapons systems up ahead, but Loki could not shut them down. Hera was alert and fully in control of the area immediately around her core chamber, very much wary for intruders.

Hercules paused and tossed a couple mini-grenades up into the room beyond, and they took cover in the room at the bottom of the stairs as they exploded. Hercules headed up to check it out, and fired off a shot at one auto-gun that had managed to remain functional during the explosions. He nodded to the others that it was safe to come up, and they followed him to the top floor.

"The doughnuts are in the box," said a voice from Jannika's comm.

"Peon?" Jannika said. "What are you doing? Where did you run off to?"

"I've hooked up with the blokes at the bottom of the lift," Peon replied. "Had a few issues down here, almost got killed, found Job's body and grabbed this wrist comm. We'll hold the fort down here as best we can."

"We'll let you know if we need a hand with anything."

"Hera should be right down that hall," Loki said. "Oh my."

"What is it?" Jannika asked.

"Be wary, folks," Loki said. "She is up to something, but I cannot penetrate her defenses to pinpoint just what."

"This is it, people," Hercules said. "The moment of truth. We may go down in fire this day, but we will take this bitch machine with us!"

He might not have the raw charisma of the late Job, but his way with words was definitely succinct and to the point. Weapons at ready, Hercules and a handful of the other rebels stormed head-on into Hera's core chambers. Jannika held back with Anastasia and Tasha and a couple others of the survivors, and headed around to circle around to approach from the side.

As they got around to the entrance to the chamber, Jannika got her first glimpse of Hera, terrible and beautiful one might say. A shimmering shield of radiant blue surrounded the central core, deflecting Hercules's best attempts to attack her. Hera's own defense systems were very much online and hot, streaming plasma and rockets toward Hercules's team.

"We need to get that shield down!" Hercules called out.

"How?" Jannika wondered, looking around for anything that might indicate a power source for it.

"You're not going to like this," Loki said. "I think it's in the basement."

"Peon!" Jannika said into the comm. "Get the doughnuts to the basement. We need you to shut down any power sources you find!"

"We're on it," Peon replied.

"We're all counting on you, Peon!" Jannika said, then muttered to herself, "We're screwed."

Tasha went to duck away from Hera's fire out into the hallway again, then said, "We've got more problems. That robot back there was not one of a kind."

"Helvíti!" Jannika spat. "Hercules, get away from the shield, let Peon take it down first, let's take care of this robot."

"Another one from over here!" said one of the other rebels momentarily before getting snatched off his feet and hurled through a wall.

"Two at _once_?" Jannika said.

"Ah shit," Tasha muttered.

Tasha began to fire her plasma rifle rapidly at the floor in front of the robot, and at first Jannika thought she was just having terrible aim. But the robot stepped forward and Tasha finished carving a circle in the floor with heavy plasma fire, and the floor gave way under the robot's massive weight, causing it to go crashing through to the storey below.

Hercules ducked back into the hallway with the girls, firing shot after shot at the robot heading toward them. They took cover as it fired its rocket toward them, managing to avoid the worst of the attack. They darted back down the hallway toward the elevator again.

"The other robot is coming back up the elevator," Loki said.

The lift doors opened and they found themselves trapped in the corridor between two large killer robots. "Hit the deck!" Jannika said, and they flattened themselves against the ground at the last minute as the robots fired their rockets at one another. Both robots were badly damaged in the blast, but all of them were hurt to some extent by the blast. Jannika did a quick count of who was left, but saw only her friends and Hercules. None of the other rebels were still alive or on their feet.

"The doughnuts have holes," Peon said through the comm. "We've got a man down, but I think we've found the main power core."

"Shut it down!" Hercules roared into his wrist-comm. "I don't care if you need to smash the fucker down with your bare hands!"

Jannika added, "But explosives would probably work better."

Hercules went over to the damaged robots one by one and fired into their works a couple times to ensure that they wouldn't be causing the group any further trouble. Hercules reloaded his huge gun again as they slowly clambered to their feet again, wincing and bloody from the attacks, and stumbled toward the entrance to Hera's core chamber again.

"Is everyone alright for the moment?" Jannika asked quietly.

"I'm fine," Tasha said. "I'm glad most of that was just shrapnel and projectile weapons and not the damned plasma. Bits of metal I can deal with, fire I can't."

"Get that shield down already, Peon," Hercules snarled into his comm.

"I'm working on it!" Peon replied.

"Just toss a grenade in it or something and back up," Hercules suggested.

"I've got it, I've got it!" Peon said. Ahead of them in Hera's room, the shimmering blue forcefield fizzled out of existence. Lights all over the building went out.

Hercules grinned broadly and hefted his big-ass gun, striding foreward into the room. "Not feeling so hot now, are you Hera?"

Some of the weapons systems, however, were still online. One of them landed a bullet square in Hercules's knee, bringing him to the ground. Hercules growled aloud and fired off several shots at the AI's guns, taking them out in rapid succession. He pulled out the explosives from his pack and crawled over toward the machine.

"Get out of here now, girls," Hercules said to them. "I'll make sure that this old bitch gets what's coming to her. Go!"

Jannika didn't feel like arguing, and turned for the door, saying softly, "Goodbye, Hercules."

Hercules nodded slightly, and said softly, "This is for you, Charon."

They pulled out their flashlights and began to race down several flights of stairs with the power out. As they were almost to the bottom floor, they heard an enormous rumble from high above, and the entire building shook. Fragments of the ceiling hailed upon them for a moment. They scrambled down the last flight into the basement and found Peon and the two remaining rebels waiting for them there.

"We need to get out of here," Jannika said. "Hercules set up us the bomb. The whole building should be collapsing on top of us anytime now."

They headed back down into the tunnels as quickly as they could manage with their wounded. As they reached the relative safety of the old mine tunnels, Jannika felt the full impact of all the wounds she had taken painfully coming to the forefront again, the adrenaline draining from her veins and leaving her feeling weak and weary again.

The small group stopped in a cave not too far from the adminsitration center to tend their wounds. The rebels weren't too badly wounded as they hadn't been in the thick of things, but Jannika and Anastasia had taken things pretty badly between the robots. Tasha seemed okay, but then, she was a vampire. She reached over to Jannika after tending to Anastasia and offered her a bleeding wrist.

"Here," Tasha said quietly. "You can use it to heal your wounds if you want."

Jannika smiled faintly at her and said, "Thanks," and leaned over to take her up on that, and Tasha briefly explained just how to do it. Although the idea of being bound to Tasha had made her a tad leery at first, there was something immensely comforting in the thought that she'd also be cared for and protected, as well as gladly protect and care for in return as well as she was able.

Feeling much better, the group headed on back to the rebel camp again. They were greeted with much interest, then elation upon learning that their impossible quest had been a resounding success. There was also sorrow at the deaths of Job and Hercules. Although some deaths had been expected, those would hurt the rebel movement badly... but with Hera dead, there was no longer as much need for it.

Peon pulled the girls aside and whispered to them, "Girls, you've got to help me."

"What's the problem?" Tasha wondered.

"They want me to be their new leader."

"What, you don't want that?" Jannika said, raising an eyebrow.

"You know why I was still alive when I ran into the others down there?" Peon said. "It was because I got scared and hid! I'm a coward. I do terrible under pressure and I hate to fight."

"Sometimes," Anastasia said, "a coward might make the best leader. You would not sacrifice their lives in vain. I believe things will be far easier on your group now that Hera has been destroyed, however."

"There's still some of Hera's elites that probably survived the battle," Peon said. "But yeah, I suppose. Still, this isn't exactly something I'd ever anticipated, or for that matter wanted or wished for in my wildest dreams."

Anastasia grinned faintly and said, "The best leaders are often also those who do not wish to be leaders. Would you prefer someone in charge who was mad with power and eager to grab onto whatever influence he could find?"

Peon thought for a moment and said, "I'd rather have someone like one or another of you ladies, honestly."

Tasha smirked at him. "Sorry, Peon. We're not going to be staying. Come the next sunset, we'll be seeing about heading out of here and, well, flying off into the sunset."

"We'll give you another delivery from the replicators before we go, though," Jannika said. "Of whatever sorts of food you might want."

"Could you not simply give us the schematics for the replicators?"

"I'm afraid not," Jannika said. "Not now, anyway. For one thing, you don't have the resources to build one, nor the kind of power source it would require. But maybe at some point in the future, we might be able to."

"There really should be no problems with food around here anyway," Anastasia pointed out. "From a cursory examination of the state of your farmland, you must produce an ample surplus for your population, even with how overcrowded some areas are. I believe much of it was being wasted and sent to Hera's elite for their own personal use."

"You may well be right about that, too," Peon said. "Alright, fine. I was going to ask if I could come along, too, but I suppose I'll stay here and be the horrible leader they have to expect me to be. But I've got to ask for one thing before you go tomorrow night."

"What's that?" Jannika asked.

"Doughnuts."


	16. Spiderwebs

"Moira dear, any news on Pandora Corp?" Susan asked.

"They are presently working on constructing a dimensional gateway. My estimates indicate that at their current rate of progress, this may take several months for them to complete."

"Bah," Susan said. "My agent's been busy around there, but I don't want to shut down the experiment, after all. I want to see where this is going. Just think... the discovery of alternate universes, an entire multiverse open for exploration? It could be marvelous! Have you picked up anything further that might indicate other dimensional breaches?"

"Negative. However, I have been monitoring the progress of those who escaped from planet Midgard. This has proven to be most fascinating, as their propulsion technology appears to be magnitudes beyond that which is known in this universe."

"Oh? Just how fast are we talking here?"

"See the screen for a chart of their flight path. Although their trip to Svartheim took longer than the other jumps would indicate, they appear to have travelled there partly in the hold of another ship, possibly pirates. They, however, had little trouble escaping, from the looks of things, and there were few survivors to the pirate crew."

"What the hell did they do on planet Idyll?" Susan wondered, peering intently at the chart and raising an eyebrow.

"The administrative AI there, Hera, appears to have been destroyed while they were on the planet. I would not rule out their being responsible for it in some way. I am not sorry to see Hera go. She was growing increasingly unstable and was not using her resources efficiently, as well as attracting undue attention from entirely the wrong angles."

"I would dearly love to get my hands on their technology and take a good look at how it works. If they have so much faster propulsion systems, who knows what else they might have available? Hmm. Their travel speed will make putting an agent in their path difficult, however. Can you give me an estimate on where they are likely to be in the near future?"

"Judging by their current activities, they have been spending a fair deal of time doing resource trading in order to acquire money in a most efficient manner while still travelling across the galaxy. I can estimate a list of likely locations that they may stop along their current general trajectory."

"This flight path... You don't suppose they're heading for planet Pandora, do you?"

"It is entirely possible, Susan. They may have acquired the same information that I have about Pandora's activities, although what they intend to do about it is beyond my ability to guess at the present time. However, if that is their ultimate destination, they do not appear to be in any particular hurry to reach that location."

Susan paced about the room, musing to herself. "I have a thought. This is going to take a bit of setup, however. Your calculations show that they're very likely to go to Butler Station at some point... my agent will be there waiting for them. We're also going to need to make sure that Pandora Corp can follow through with their plans without intervention, and that these interdimensional travellers don't get caught and impounded by the government or anyone else."

"Their own AI appears to have had much success in shutting down any courses of inquiry by official channels into their activities, for the moment at least. I will make sure to keep it so, however, should anything slip through the cracks."

"See to it. I have work to do."

* * *

Meandering their way through the galaxy, the crew of Sleipnir was making a decent amount of money as they rested and recuperated from their ordeals. Now that they weren't in any immediate danger of being killed or drawn into a situation that they had no personal involvement in, they had a chance to take a bit of a breather. Loki had proven quite successful in keeping the authorities off their backs, and they had not received undue scrutiny or even a second glance from any of the colonies and stations they had landed at.

"So, Jannika," Tasha wondered absently. "Getting each for excitement and adventure again?"

Jannika shrugged, munching on a calzone. "It's been a much-welcome break. I just feel that there's so much more that could be done. And we haven't really made any progress into obtaining that warp coil beyond getting some money along the way. And if we did manage to get it, how would all the money in the universe even be useful to us then? Do they take interdimensional credits in other universes?"

"Sometimes," Tasha said with a grin. "Depends on the universe. The ones that have become used to the idea of other universes existing generally do."

"Seems just a very strange idea to me," Jannika said. "How can you even be sure just how much your money is worth compared to theirs?"

Tasha shrugged helplessly. "How can you be sure with any exchange system? Somebody just figures it out and adjusts it as need be."

Jannika chuckled softly, popping the last bit of calzone into her mouth, and licked off her fingers. She stared at the floor quietly for a long moment before saying, "You know, Tasha, I've been thinking. I've always thought of myself as straight, you know, and I'm certainly not deciding to randomly be a lesbian. But I've realized that I love you, in a way."

Tasha gave a crooked grin. "I imagine that's likely in part because of that bond I mentioned when you decided to accept my blood."

"So I figured. It's a very strange feeling nonetheless," Jannika said softly. "Not, mind you, that I'm exactly complaining or anything. I just didn't expect it to be quite so... intense at times."

"If we do manage to get this warp coil and get to the point where we can visit other universes again, one of the places I'd like to see is the world Alistair was originally from," Tasha mused aloud. "I know so little about the place, and what little I do know makes me immensely curious about it. Perhaps I might even learn a thing or two from it."

"So who was this Alistair to you, anyway?" Jannika wondered. "Was he the one who made you a vampire?"

"No," Tasha explained. "My sire, that is, the person who made me a vampire, was a woman by the name of Vanessa Jordan. Alistair was the one who made _her_ a vampire."

"Oh, so he's like, your vampire grandpa or some such," Jannika said. "I see."

Anastasia wandered into the room and over to the replicator to call up a strawberry pastry, and sat down at the table across from them. "How are things today?"

"There's no days in space," Jannika said. "You slept in again."

Anastasia shrugged. "And I am eating pastry for breakfast. What of it?" She grinned innocently.

"Well, you're just in time," Jannika said. "Tasha was just about to tell all about how she became a vampire and what things were like in Karzan. Or have you heard all that already?"

"I have not," Anastasia said.

"I was?" Tasha said, smirking. "Oh, alright, alright."

Jannika went over and replicated a big bowl of popcorn and sat down at the table to munch on it. "Should I dim the lights and bring in Loki to illustrate it with irreverently inappropriate images?"

"No, that's quite alright," Tasha said. "Okay, so. My story begins a few years ago, back when I'd just recently gotten out of college and was spending far too much of my time wasting it at nightclubs, partying, and attempting to be a part of the 'zotty' scene."

"Zotty?" Anastasia repeated, quirking her lips in some amusement.

"Yeah, yeah. Karzan slang for cool, hip, nifty, swell, groovy, you get the drift. I spent all my time trying to be popular, and it wound me at the wrong place at the right time. Or perhaps the _right_ place, considering what wound up coming from it. Alistair and Vanessa came into the nightclub we were partying at and turned everyone in the room into vampires."

"Everyone?" Jannika wondered, raising an eyebrow. "So indiscriminately? Why would they do that?"

"We were to be, apparently, blood donors. You know what I did with you and Jannika? How I made you ghouls? They intended on doing this to the entire Karzan Empire. They meant to control the Empire through the Church, making Vanessa into a sort of Messiah figure and reinforcing their hold on the Empire every Sunday with the sacramental wine... spiked with vampire blood. They blood bound the _entire Empire_."

"Holy shit, that's insane," Jannika said.

"You're telling me," Tasha said, nodding in agreement. "I don't know how long this went on with me being locked up unconscious, before the lot of us were brought out again and taken back to the Imperial capital. They'd found a better solution, by making the priests themselves vampires, so we were accorded somewhat more freedom. I was, of course, lumped in with the group of 'zotties' again, and it seemed even Vanessa had considerable disdain for that segment of society.

Tasha went on, "We were given tasks, and they seemed so vital and important at the time. I wound up in a clash of petty politics with Gina, one of the others from that group, over who should be the group's effective leader. I didn't really want anything to do with them, and it seems pretty irrelevent in hindsight now, but I wound up being the leader of the 'zotties'. Not that that actually meant all that much in the grand scheme of things.

"So, things went on like that for a while, and then some trouble started brewing. A very old and powerful guy, some sort of demon or something, had appeared in the Karzan Universe and decided to take over Earth. Things got a bit messy, and even after he was apparently killed, Vanessa feared that my life and that of the other 'zotties' was in danger, and told us to flee and take shelter wherever we could.

"I don't know what ever might have happened to the others. I wound up making my way to the fringes of the galaxy, and caught only bits and pieces of the news of what was happening in the Empire, wild rumors and gossip at best. They said the Earth was destroyed, no, it was back, that it was never gone. They said that Vanessa had ascended to the heavens to become a demigod of sorts. I could only guess that it was a coverup for her having been killed.

Tasha went quiet for a long moment before continuing, "So from there, I joined on with the Karzan Exploration Brigade, to get the hell out of that universe before things got even worse than they already were, and before anyone started looking for _me_."

"Man," Jannika murmured. "So I take it, no matter where we might go from here, revisiting the Karzan Universe is definitely _not_ on the itinerary."

"No kidding," Tasha agreed.

"Do you know what might have happened to Alistair also?" Anastasia asked. "And are you certain that Vanessa was slain in the ensuing events?"

"I can't be sure," Tasha said. "The rumors never mentioned Alistair. He prefered to stay out of the spotlight and work things behind the scenes for the most part, so far as I could tell. But they might have as easily fled from the universe as well when they realized trouble was coming and they were right in the crosshairs. Alistair was an old vampire, how old I cannot say, and you don't survive that long without having some sort of survival instinct to get out of the way of trouble when you see it coming. So if they're still alive, I'm willing to bet they're in Alistair's home universe."

"You would want to meet up with them again, even after what they did to you and how they used you?" Jannika said, raising an eyebrow.

"I would," Tasha replied. "I think, in the end there, they knew what they had been doing was wrong and were on their way to some sort of redemption. Vanessa wasn't a bad person, but was drawn into that entire plot, and she never really struck me as having ever _wanted_ to become Karzan's Messiah. And she may well have saved my life by giving me that forewarning."

"I'll reserve judgment," Jannika said. "But if you say so, I'll trust you." She grinned broadly at Tasha.

"So what is our next destination?" Anastasia asked.

"Butler Station," Jannika said. "Fair-sized trading outpost. Bet we'll get a good price on those power converters there."

"Would it be entirely dishonest to sell replicated goods?" Anastasia suggested with a crooked grin. "Certainly the replicators cannot handle more complex materials, but I imagine there are places around the galaxy which would pay for 'fresh' foods."

Jannika chuckled softly. "Not such a terrible idea, come to think of it. We could even sell it at a discount, for the sake of 'honesty', since it's lower quality goods than the real thing, technically. And a bit of extra income never hurts."

"We just need to figure out what we're going to do with that income," Tasha said. "At least the Idyllic rebels were nice enough to let us keep some of their weapons."

"Paying for training?" Anastasia suggested with a smirk.

"And paying people to otherwise help us," Tasha said. "Though I'd personally trust someone more who wasn't bound by money and contract alone. This isn't such a bad universe, more or less, but given what we're looking to go up against, I'll take all the help we can get."


	17. Mysteries

Butler Station was a major center of commerce and trade amongst the galaxy, a spinning cylinder rotating high above an uninhabited, desolate world. Numerous ships were docked here, coming and going, buying and selling. Jannika made it a testament to Loki's alertness that the authories here had no idea that they should be looking out for this particular ship and crew. Certainly they'd known about the incident on Idyll for quite some time, but had no connection of it to them. Jannika put in an offer to sell their load of power converters on the station's electronic marketplace as they docked.

Shortly after they arrived, Jannika received a message directed at her. "Hmm, what's this?" she murmured, bringing it up. "Hey, guys, you might want to take a look at this."

"What is it?" Tasha asked, coming up to take a look at Jannika's console. "Does someone want to arrest us or something?"

"No, no," Jannika said. "It's a fellow I used to know on the net. Haven't heard from him in quite a while. Calen Tran is his name, but Virtual Whimsy is his usual handle."

"What manner of name is that?" Anastasia wondered in puzzlement.

"The name of someone who spends too much time on the internet, often doing or discussing things they probably ought not to be?" Jannika said, smirking. "Never really knew him too well. He really wants to meet with us, though, mentioned something about Pandora Corp."

"This could be interesting," Tasha said thoughtfully. "Or alternatively dangerous. We'd best be cautious, just in case. Take some small sidearms, just in case. Probably a good idea, regardless. This might not be an out-of-the-way pirate base where anything might happen to you if you aren't wary, but we do have a habit of attracting trouble at times regardless."

Jannika nodded in agreement, and the three of them equipped themselves with stun sticks and mini-blazers. Nothing that would be too immediately obvious or cause undue scrutiny if someone questioned why they had them, at least. Another message came in momentarily from a Jugal Agarwal, offering a price for their power converters.

"It's a good offer," Jannika commented. "I'd best go take care of this. Go on ahead and shop or look around a bit, or go find Calen or something. I'll catch up to you in a bit once I'm done with Mr. Agarwal."

"We'll go do some shopping. See you later," Tasha said. "Maybe we'll find a good deal on something to stuff our cargo hold with on the way out."

Jannika went to see this Jugal Agarwal fellow, but he was feeling fairly difficult. He didn't quite have the money on him, he insisted, and tried to haggle with her a bit, then got annoyed and started arguing that power converters weren't nearly worth that much anyway. Finally she determined he was just wasting her time, and decided to head off to find Tasha and Anastasia.

She checked her wrist-comm for their locations and found that it looked like they'd decided to go and see Calen after all. Still annoyed with the matter over that jerkass prospective buyer, she headed on out that way around the habitation ring to the quarters Calen had listed for them to come visit.

The door to Calen's quarters slid open when she approached, and she halted in the doorway to see Tasha and Anastasia in the room, and a man laying on the floor, completely still and staring out of dead eyes. Anastasia was more than a little freaked out at the moment, and Tasha glanced up at her worriedly. There wasn't any immediate sign of blood or violence on the body or in the room.

"What--" Jannika murmured, stepping into the room and letting the door slide shut. "What happened here?"

"I don't know," Tasha said uneasily. "He was dead when we got here, I swear."

"Relax, I believe you," Jannika said with a quirk of her lips. "Just because you're a vampire doesn't mean you go around killing people at random."

"What are we going to do?" Anastasia said. "This is not good. We had best be gone from here and ensure that we cannot be traced back to this location. If they catch us and question us, they may well discover what other things we _were_ responsible for."

"No kidding," Tasha said. "And like we haven't had enough trouble with people shooting at us as it is?"

"Why would someone have wanted to kill Calen?" Jannika said, squatting down to peer at the body.

"We should probably leave everything untouched," Anastasia said. "So that we won't get our fingerprints over everything."

"Fingerprints?" Jannika said in confusion. "Who uses those for any sort of evidence anymore?"

Anastasia blinked. "So how would they be able to tell who killed him? Psychics again?"

"Possibly. It's also possible that they may not have one around. If they do, we're fine -- we know we didn't kill him. If not, well, that may be a problem."

"Didn't he mention something about Pandora Corp in his message to us?" Tasha said. "Check the computer."

"Good idea," Jannika said, going over to the table where Calen's laptop had been left open. She frowned deeply as she poked about in it quickly and said, "No such luck. Whoever did this was very thorough. It's been wiped clean."

"I'll bet you that he knew something," Tasha said. "He knew something that was going on that someone didn't want him getting to the right person."

"Why wouldn't he just post it in the internet then?" Jannika said.

Tasha smirked. "Anyone can post things on the internet. That doesn't mean it's going to be listened to, or that it's going to get to the right ears. And what if he wanted a specific person to get the information he had, and not for it to be spread around all over?"

"You have a point," Jannika said.

"We should get out of here," Anastasia said. "Before somebody else happens to catch us here."

"Great idea," Jannika said, heading for the door again, very much worried about the situation.

By the time they got back to the ship, however, the station was on a partial state of lockdown. "Notice," spoke a comm speaker in the docking area. "Pending a current investigation, all those leaving Butler Station will need to be scanned before being allowed to leave. Thank you for your patience and your cooperation."

"That's no good," Tasha commented, glancing over the cargo hold. "Hey, I thought you found a buyer for this stuff?"

"So did I," Jannika said. "Mr. Agarwal backed out of it however and just wanted to be wasting my time, it seems. Jerk-ass."

"We will not be able to leave the station until they have found the murderer," Anastasia said. "Although we will probably be able to pass their scan, what if it is detected what else we have been responsible for?"

"I really don't like the sounds of this," Tasha said.

An incoming message appeared on Jannika's wrist-comm. She raised an eyebrow and tapped it to listen to the message. "This is Constable King. Station records indicate that you recently received a communication from a Mr. Calen Tran. When you have a moment, please stop by my office so we can have a chat about this."

"A demand couched in a polite request." Anastasia shook her head nervously.

Jannika said, "An understandable line of investigation. At least they don't suspect us _too_ closely to it. We'd best go talk to him, I suppose. We won't be able to go anywhere else regardless, and he'll just get suspicious if we refuse."

"Still don't like this, either way," Tasha said. "But fine. Let's go. And bring Loki."

* * *

"Ah, hello, ladies. I am Constable King, and this is my associate, Destiny Jackson." The constable was a broad man with a thick mustache, and he smelled heavily of cigars. Destiny, on the other hand, was a slight woman, twitchy and constantly nervous, looking as though she'd rather be anywhere but here at the moment.

Destiny murmured softly, "They have the taste of death around them. All of them."

"Thank you, Destiny," Constable King said, and directed his attention to them. "I understand that you received a message from Mr. Calen Tran not long ago. If I may inquire, what was the content of this message? What did Mr. Tran want? Were you previously acquainted with him?"

"I knew him through the internet," Jannika said. "We were to meet with him here today."

"I see," King said. "And why did you not go to meet him?"

"I was delayed," Jannika said. "I was meeting with a prospective buyer for a load of power converters that we brought in to sell. The transaction proved more difficult than I had anticipated, though, and wound up not making the sale."

"I see, I see," King went on. "And did you merely intend to meet with him to catch up on your friendship, or did he have something specific he wished to speak with you about?"

"He mentioned something about Pandora Corp," Jannika said. "But he wouldn't go into details over the network. I can only guess that he might have known something that someone wanted to keep quiet and killed him over it."

Constable King's lips quirked faintly. "Who said anything about him having been killed? I certainly did not."

Jannika blinked for a moment, realizing she had made a grievous slip of the tongue. Anastasia swiftly put in, "Your associate mentioned something about the 'taste of death' around us, did she not?"

"Uh-huh," King said. "Ms. Jackson is a psychic, of course."

Destiny said nervously, "I can sense changes in the fabric of life. Powerful events such as birth and death leave a strong residue that I can detect. You have each caused or otherwise been directly involved in the deaths of one or more sentient beings very recently. Now, this is not an immediate assumption of guilt, of course, as you may have merely been in the wrong place at the wrong time, or having killed solely in self-defense, but it is quite clear that the sense is there nonetheless, I'm afraid."

Constable King steepled his fingers and leaned over his desk, looking intently over at them. "Now, tell me, ladies, everything that you know about Calen Tran's death."

Jannika could only assume, from his ease at being in a room with three potential murderers, that the room had some sort of automated defensive system or there were guards ready to back him up at the slightest notice of trouble. She was more than a little uneasy, and knew that that didn't help her case much, but she couldn't help it. She was dreadfully afraid of being caught.

Anastasia smoothly stepped in. "Whilst Jannika was speaking with Mr. Agarwal about the matter of the power converters, I and Tasha went to visit Mr. Tran. However, when we arrived there, he was already dead. Jannika arrived shortly afterward."

Destiny said quietly, "The sense of death I feel may well have been caused merely by being in the vicinity of the man shortly after he had died."

Constable King asked, "If you knew he was dead, why did you not report the matter to station security immediately?"

Anastasia cleared her throat lightly. "We were, of course, afraid of being caught and thereby associated with the crime. We did not know if you had a psychic available who would be able to determine conclusively that we were not responsible for the man's death. As useful as Ms. Jackson's abilities may be to your investigations, I am afraid that they do not particularly help us."

Constable King turned to his console and looked over some things before saying, "You also need to stop meddling in the records. It says here you have an outstanding warrant from planet Midgard. Some matter of suspicion of theft, refusal to submit to questioning, and flying an unregistered vehicle?"

Anastasia made a face. "That would be _why_ we did not wish to be caught."

"Understandably," King said. "I'm afraid I'm going to have to place the four of you under arrest."

Loki piped up from Jannika's backpack, "Hey! I didn't even do anything!"

"Meddling with records is a galactic crime," Constable King said with a smirk. "As is being an accomplice in the committing of a crime." The doors opened and several security guards came through. Constable King gestured to the three women and said, "Take them away."

* * *

They found themselves each in tiny individual cells, and even Loki was locked up in a room to prevent him from connecting to anything outside. Jannika could suppose that it beat the Vikings, as they could be sure they'd not be mistreated here at least, but at least the Vikings could have been bribed.

She was most worried about Tasha, and wasn't sure just how long she would be able to go without blood. And if she didn't even pretend to eat, they'd assume she was on a hunger strike, and then they might find out the truth of the matter. She didn't know how the station security would react to the revelation that Tasha was a vampire, really, honestly a vampire, but she couldn't imagine that it would exactly help their case at all and that no good was likely to come of it.

The next day, however, Constable King came through and opened their cells, and tossed Loki in to Jannika to catch. Jannika raised an eyebrow as she caught him and stood up, wondering what was going on.

"Well, do you want out or not?" King asked with a smirk. "I'd be happy to leave you in there if you insist."

"What's going on?" Jannika said, stepping out of the cell.

"We've contacted planet Midgard. They've dropped their warrant against you and decline to press charges." Constable King smirked broadly and added, "Not that we don't suspect foul play in that regard too. A significant sum of money appeared in their accounts recently, more than enough to cover the components that mysteriously disappeared. But it didn't come from your account or anyone you're known to be associated with previously."

"So who was it then?" Jannika wondered.

"Does the name Olga Zoltai ring any bells?" Constable King asked. Jannika gave him a blank look. "Nope? Didn't think so. And by the way, never take up poker, kid."

"What about the business with Calen Tran?" Jannika asked.

"We've got some other suspects at the moment who are far more likely to have actually been involved," King said. "Note that you're not cleared to leave the station until we've found the killer, but we're not going to hold you for that for the moment. Just don't cause anymore trouble. Keep your nose clean, or we'll be seeing each other again. And you don't want to see me again."

Constable King turned and strode away, leaving them to make their own way back toward their ship, very confused at the moment but not really complaining about the matter. Along the way, Loki's checking also revealed some other interesting things. Sleipnir had been officially registered through legitimate channels, even the AI involved as well as the ship itself. This time, although Jannika's own name was on the registrations, the name it had been filed under was Casey Strauman.

"Okay, who the hell are Olga Zoltai and Casey Strauman, and what do they want with us?" Jannika wondered when they got back to Sleipnir, climbing up to the mess hall.

"Your guess is as good as mine," Tasha said.

Loki put in, "I'm not having much luck tracing the names. They may be false identities."

"They may realize that we have highly advanced technology for the area and be interested in examining it," Anastasia said. "We have not precisely been the most subtle at times, and while your records meddling may have kept anyone from looking too closely, our flight path alone should indicate that we, at the very least, have far faster engines than is typical around here."

"This is true," Loki said.

"Yeah, well," Jannika said. "Personally, I'm inclined to say at this point that if someone really wants our damned technology, they can _have_ it. I'm sick of all this running from the law, constantly wondering if we're going to be able to get out of it _this_ time, worrying what might happen if they realize Tasha's a vampire, and so forth. They've helped us out of a serious jam here, and I'd say when the killer is found an we can leave here, we go and pay her a visit."

"You make some good points," Tasha said quietly. "But I'm not sure that that's such a good idea. We don't even know them; would we want to trust this technology with them as well? And are they in any way associated with Pandora Corp?"

"I'm working on it," Loki said. "I'm fairly certain that they're false identities. Whether they're even the same person or different people is difficult to tell."

"Let's find out who they are," Jannika said, sitting down next to his screen and staring at the data as it came out, scratching her head. "There's enough discrepancies in the records to assume they're false identities, but that doesn't really give much to go on about just who this person or persons is and why they're helping us."

"This really bothers me for some reason," Tasha said. "I smell a rat somewhere, and this entire business just does not quite add up."

"You don't say," Jannika said dryly. "Whoever it was, covered their tracks quite well, however."

"We should see about finishing up our business transactions here and be ready to leave when we can," Anastasia said. "Hopefully the good constable will find the real killer in the meantime and we will be able to depart."

Tasha shook her head. "Somehow, I get this feeling he's not going to find the real killer."

"They can't keep the place locked down forever, though," Jannika said. "A week or two, tops, before people start getting antsy. If that psychic, Destiny Jackson, is the best they've got, the sorts they'll be preventing from leaving will be along the shadier side of things, even if they aren't actually responsible for _this_ crime."

"You know," Anastasia said thoughtfully. "If I were going to kill someone on this station, and be able to get away with it, I would probably know beforehand about Destiny Jackson and her specific powers. Therefore, I would make certain that I could not be detected as having been a killer or otherwise 'tainted' with death. I wonder if Ms. Jackson would be able to detect if someone had, say, poisoned him but been nowhere near him when he actually died."

"You may be on to something there," Tasha said. "So if they were smart, a professional killer, the murderer could be just about anyone. They might have even left the station already. Which would be a real problem for us, as we could then be stuck here for weeks pending their investigation. Not that that's the end of the world or anything, but it's a freaking nuisance."

Jannika's comm beeped as she received a text message. Quirking an eyebrow thoughtfully, she read it over and said, "We've got another offer for the power converters. Hell, it's a better one than Mr. Agarwal's offer, even."

"At least something's going our way this week," Tasha said with a smirk. "Beyond getting let out of jail period, that is."

"Well, shall we see what we can get from this Brandy O'Halloran, or would you two rather stay here?" Jannika said, not commenting on what she thought they might like to do here by themselves.

"Let's go," Tasha said, Anastasia nodding in agreement.

They grabbed shock sticks and sidearms, and headed off to meet with the potential buyer. It was far more comfortable to be walking around free and armed again, and Jannika quietly promised herself that she would not allow herself or her friends to be help prisoner like that again. Twice was already twice too many times.

The three of them, plus Loki in Jannika's backpack again, came to the quarters in question. Inside, there was a lean woman, almost as tall as Anastasia, with pale skin and bleached blonde hair, wearing a silver catsuit. She glanced up from the terminal she was glancing over at them when they came in, and gave a quirk of a grin.

"Hello," Jannika said, stepping inside and nodding to her in greeting. "Brandy O'Halloran, I presume?"

"Oh, yes," the woman said. "And Olga Zoltai, and Casey Straumann, among other names. But you can call me Melissa."

Jannika blinked at her. "You-- You're the one who got us out of jail?"

"That was me, yes," Melissa said. "Sloppy of you. Such amateurs. But I've taken care of that, now. They won't be after you again."

"Well, thank you, thank you very much," Jannika said. "But why did you help us? We don't even know you."

Melissa smiled sweetly at them. "I was a friend of Calen Tran as well. I know he was looking for help, and I know you didn't kill him. You just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time, sadly, and got caught up in things. You were also incautious and sloppy. But I can help you."

Anastasia said, "I take it that the bid on our power converters was merely a convenient excuse to be able to speak with us without attracting further undue suspicion, am I correct?"

Melissa nodded to her. "Correct. But I'll happily take them off your hands if you like, for the full price."

"You said you could help us?" Jannika said.

"Oh, yes," Melissa said. "I know what Calen was here for. A matter of vital importance. We must work to carry on his mission, that he may not have died in vain."

"This has something to do with Pandora Corp, doesn't it," Jannika said. "What the hell have they been up to that he was so worried about?"

"Pardon me, if I might interject for a moment?" Loki said. "Bring me out and open my screen. I believe you will want to see this."

Jannika pulled out the box from her backpack and set him on the table, flipping open the top. Melissa gave a crooked grin of amusement at Loki. Jannika was sure Loki was used to getting looks like that by now. Loki's screen changed to a three dimensional image of what looked like an archway with a glowing blue coil on the top. The image rotated around to let them get a look at its proportions and scale.

"Isn't that the--" Jannika murmured, pointing at the coil.

"Yes," Loki said. "Pandora Corp appears to be building an interdimensional gateway."

Jannika looked to Melissa. "Is this what you were refering to?"

"Oh yes," Melissa said. "There are those who have been trying to sabotage the project. Calen was trying to find help to prevent that from happening, but as these agents work for the government itself, he didn't trust going to public sources with it. The government could not get the project officially shut down, so they decided to take the off-the-record channels instead."

"So he wanted _our_ help in stopping them!" Jannika said.

"Precisely," Melissa said.

Loki put in, "You know, once that gate is fully open, I theorize that it may well be much easier to travel between dimensions from this universe. We will still want to acquire a warp coil, of course, but it would probably wind up being quicker travel time and lower power requirements for penetrating the boundaries."

"That could also potentially be a bad thing, also," Tasha pointed out wryly. "My home universe must have gotten invaded by beings from at least three or four different universes during a short period of time after it was really opened up to interdimensional travel."

"But think of the opportunities!" Jannika said, grinning widely.

Tasha chuckled softly and said, "Alright, alright. Just if things turn out badly, don't say I didn't tell you so."

Melissa said, "If we want to stop these saboteurs, we must get to planet Pandora, and quickly."

"But how?" Jannika said. "They won't let us leave the station until they've found Calen's murderer."

"Leave that to me," Melissa said. "Be ready to leave by tomorrow. I will, of course, be going with you as well."

"Alright," Jannika said. "We'll have to see about taking care of the cargo business, then. Do stop by our ship anytime."

"I will do so."


	18. Pandora Corp

Soon enough, they finished up dealing with the cargo and getting in a new load of goods to take to planet Pandora, and primarily hung around near the ship waiting for Melissa to make good on her word to make sure things were cleared up so that they could leave. They didn't really care to go wandering around and wind up getting framed for yet another murder or something.

The next day, sure enough, Melissa appeared in the docking bay and approached Sleipnir to come in. "Everything's taken care of," she said as she climbed inside. "Time to go."

Jannika checked the console and said, "You're right, the station's no longer on lockdown. They'll let us leave now. How did you do it? Did you manage to find who Calen's real killer was?"

"In a manner of speaking."

Jannika powered up the engines and took off, heading out of the station and setting a course for planet Pandora. It was a trip of four days from where they were, but Jannika could understand Melissa's haste in getting there. She obviously must know that they had the fastest ship in the galaxy, after all, considering how much she had been poking around their records.

"We're on the way to Pandora," Jannika said, heading back to the mess hall and gesturing to Melissa to follow. "Time to settle in for the trip. We've got three extra crew cabins. Take your pick, they're all pretty much the same anyway. Besides Tasha and Anastasia taking the double." She smirked faintly.

Anastasia, in the mess hall munching on a burrito, glanced up at her and raised an eyebrow. "What is the issue with that?"

Jannika chuckled softly. "None whatsoever, that's what it was included for, after all. Though I have no idea what we'd wind up doing if we had more than one couple wanting a double room."

"Do you anticipate such to become an issue at some point in the near future?" Anastasia asked in puzzlement.

Tasha, sitting across the table from Anastasia, grinned up at them and said, "Jannika, you cad. We just met Melissa and you're already getting the hots for her?"

Jannika blushed fiercely and said, "That was not quite what I had in mind."

Melissa, if anything, seemed highly amused. "Allow me to place my belongings in one of the empty cabins. And then, please, you must give me a rundown of what amenaties this fine ship of yours has to offer, if you will."

"Yes, of course," Jannika said, gesturing to the doors leading into the small red room where the ladder to the lower deck was located. "The crew cabins are right this way, down the ladder and up the corridor."

Jannika showed her down the ladder and pointed to which of cabins were still empty, then pointed back to the room at the end of the hallway that was a communal shower room. They'd opted for that option, allowing for a bit more room, rather than tiny individual bathrooms. Once Melissa had dropped her bag into one of the empty cabins, they headed back for the ladder again.

"That door leads to the cargo hold," Jannika said, pointing it out before climbing up the ladder again. "And up here is the rec room. Some places to read, relax, watch movies, listen to music, whatever. The usual things to keep you from going stir crazy on a small ship. That door at the far end of the room leads to the engine room." She headed over toward the mess hall again. "On the right is the toilets, on the left is the bridge of course, and over here is the mess hall."

Anastasia waved up at them briefly as they entered the room again. Melissa was following along, glancing over everything with an appraising eye. This was one person she didn't think she'd wind up having to explain anything twice to. Jannika headed across the room to the large rectangular slot in the wall that was patiently waiting input.

"And this is the replicator," Jannika said, gesturing to the slot.

"Replicator?" Melissa repeated, raising an eyebrow and examining it intently.

"It's capable of making things, up to a certain level of complexity of elements," Jannika explained. "We usually use it for food, but we've also used it to make simple weapons, clothing, and other supplies."

"That could certainly be extremely useful," Melissa said in interest.

"Oh, yes, it is. You can imagine just what sort of possibilities that opens up. It's as though we have simple supplies for every occasion and all the variety of food and drink you could hope for, without devoting an inch of cargo space to it. Not, mind you, that we aren't paranoid enough to have a stash of space ration stowed away as well just in case something goes wrong, but it's definitely nice to have around."

"I can imagine," Melissa said.

"This chute next to it is the recycler. It'll break down whatever you shove into it into its constituent molecules." Jannika glanced aside to Melissa, who was poking thoughtfully at the buttons on the front of the replicator, bringing up images of various types of food. "You can also give it voice commands as to what you want, which tends to be much easier than cycling through a list or typing it in. It's getting quite good at figuring out what you probably want even from fairly vague instructions now. Allow me to demonstrate." She turned and addressed the replicator, and said, "Pizza. Thin crust. Medium. Pepperoni."

Jannika slid the resulting pizza out of the slot and sat it down on the table. Melissa thoughtfully turned to the replicator and said, "I'd like a steak, rare. Mashed potatoes and gravy. A side of salad with ranch dressing." The machine obediently materialized her order in the slot before her. She pulled it out and said, "It even makes silverware?"

"Yep!" Jannika said, grabbing a slice of her pizza. "Great, isn't it?"

"Remarkable," Melissa said, sitting down to eat tentatively. She sniffed cautiously at the meat, and then nibbled on a bit of it.

"Don't worry, it's perfectly safe," Jannika said with a grin. "There haven't been any accidents involving Sleipnir severely mangling an order, at least. Mildly mangling, on the other hand, but that's to be expected."

"So tell me, Melissa," Anastasia said. "What do you know of these saboteurs whom the government sent to shut down the project Pandora Corp has been working on?"

"I'm not even certain if there's more than one of them," Melissa admitted. "The government's been cracking down on things lately and has been sending special operatives to take care of things they couldn't get past the red tape to do publicly."

"Way to go, government," Jannika said dryly. "Our taxpayer credits at work for us."

Melissa chuckled. "Not that it's necessarily a bad way to go about things, of course, but it's one that we definitely need to be aware of and alert for. The government has hardly been known to be fully forthcoming about things in the past, but rarely have they attempted to be quite so blatant about things. It's like they aren't even pretending to be trying to follow due process any longer."

"We'll have to do some investigating when we get there to find out just who they are and what they're planning on doing," Jannika said. "Loki might be able to try and track down some information, but if the government's involved, that's a risky prospect at best."

Melissa made a bit of a face. "Yes, your pet AI has not always shown the highest level of discretion in his activities. I was able to spot his tracks from a mile away at times."

"Hey," Loki protested. "It worked well enough for most purposes!"

"Like being caught by station security under the slightest scrutiny after your own slip of the tongue landed you in trouble?" Melissa said, rolling her eyes. "You really need to work on that."

"Sorry," Jannika said sheepishly.

"You're young and inexperienced," Melissa said, waving a hand. "It's to be expected. Now, I'd think you were complete idiots if you kept making the same mistakes more than once. In your case, you tend to just keep making entirely different mistakes."

"So what _do_ you know of what we've been getting up to, anyway?" Jannika wondered. "Obviously you know about the business on Midgard, at the very least. What about the rest of it?"

"Not too much," Melissa said, shrugging. "You've been spotted in quite a number of interesting places, legitimate and otherwise. So tell me, what precisely _did_ happen on planet Svartheim?"

Jannika cleared her throat. "We were caught in a hyperspace net and captured by Vikings. Then we got away."

"In such a manner that wound up with a couple dozen dwarves messily dead and a fair amount of tenebrite ore stolen?" Melissa said wryly. "Now, there's a time and place for violence, but could you have been any _more_ blatant about it?"

"Hey, it seemed like a good idea at the time, and it worked," Jannika said.

"You were just lucky that Svartheim is such a wretched hive of a mine world that no one particularly cared about a few more dead bodies. All in all, I'm a bit surprised that any of you are even still alive."

"So," Jannika said thoughtfully. "You haven't heard anything about what happened on planet Idyll then, I take it?"

Melissa smirked. "I've heard that Hera was destroyed, and won't be particularly missed. My sources indicate that you were on the planet at the time and happen to have left shortly afterward, but if you were involved in it in any way, shape, or form, at least you practiced considerably more discretion than you have in other instances."

"We didn't actually destroy Hera ourselves, but we did assist the rebels with the matter," Jannika said.

"I'm shocked," Melissa said, feigning surprise. "You actually succeeded at a mission you took upon yourselves, and neither got caught nor killed in the process? Perhaps there's hope for you yet!" She grinned coyly at them.

"It was pretty rough at times, though," Tasha said. "Most of the rebels who went with us got killed, too."

Anastasia pointed out, "They went in fully expecting to die for their cause. We did not. We went in attempting to succeed at said mission without dying for it. If you believe that you are likely to die regardless, you may be far more willing to sacrifice yourself even pointlessly where it is not truly necessary. Not to put a damper upon all the heroic sacrifices made by the Idyllic rebels, of course, but I saw more than one which was completely unnecessary."

"A common affliction of freedom fighters of all stripes," Melissa said. "And good that you are not also afflicted with it. It is generally quite possible to succeed at a mission and remain alive at the same time."

"I would merely hope to remain that way," Anastasia said with a small grin.

* * *

Planet Pandora was a world covered primarily in a vast city, with homes, factories, restaurants, stores, and everything else that could possibly be used to be directed toward the creation of commerce. It was wholly owned and operated by the Pandora Corp in a way that no other planet could quite match. It did not make any excuse or pretense toward making lip service to democracy. All permanent residents were employees of Pandora Corp, and all facilities here were either directed toward the production of goods and services, the maintainance of their employees, shipping goods offworld, or the tourism trade.

Sleipnir landed at a spaceport on planet Pandora and the four of them split up to take care of the various tasks ahead of them. Jannika went to deal with selling the goods which they had brought from Butler Station. Melissa crept off to do some investigation of her own in the matter of the government agents they were looking for. Tasha and Anastasia went off to do their own business in looking around the place to see what they might pick up and whether they might discover anything which might be useful to them.

"Nice planet," Tasha commented, strolling along the walkways beneath the brightly-lit Pandora night, the skies blazing with signs of advertisements of all sorts.

"It seems as though if one had a mind to, one might be able to buy almost anything here," Anastasia said.

"It's like a planet-sized monument to consumerism," Tasha said, chuckling.

"So, was your pretense to explore the planet and do some investigation merely an excuse to go shopping?" Anastasia said with a crooked grin.

"Hey, I didn't see you arguing either. And this time, we actually have money, too! Admittedly, technically, we should be putting that money to better use than wandering around Pandora going on a shopping spree or something, but still. It's good to know that it's there, all the same. And it's good to take a break and goof off every now and then, too."

"How about we go to a concert?" Anastasia suggested, stopping below a sign advertising a band called the Epileptic Trees. The animated logo showed a small grove of twitching trees.

"Sounds good to me," Tasha said. "Although I'm not entirely certain just what genre 'powertwitch' might be."

They headed for the concert hall and paid their fees at the door, and headed inside. It was cheap enough, at least, and although the place was crowded, it was easily the sort of crowd that they could blend into without attracting attention. Tasha thought she might easily be able to grab a snack here while she was at it as well.

The music was so loud that it shook the building when it started playing, and the wild screaming of dozens of blissful fans only punctuated it further. It was difficult to tell just whether the music was good or bad, or even what the words were that the singer was attempting to say, but the fans certainly didn't seem to care.

Tasha and Anastasia wound up having to back a bit away from the center of the noise and head off to a somewhat quieter side room. There was a confection stand in the smaller room offering a variety of tasty treats to patrons. Looking somewhat out of place, however, was a man in a suit sitting over in the corner and delicately nibbling on a pastry.

Somewhat amused, Tasha headed over to him with a smirk and said, "An interesting place to be wearing a suit to, don't you think?" Anastasia wandered over to examine the array of candies offered.

The man smirked back at her and said, "I get that a lot. You don't look too much like the sort who would visit this type of concert yourself. Especially your friend there. Here if I'd thought dresses were still in fashion, I'd have argued the case to the clothing board."

"Oh, Anastasia? Don't mind her. She's a bit odd that way. Keeps insisting on wearing a dress even in situations it's really not called for." Tasha grinned wryly over at her. "So what _are_ you doing here, then?"

"I'm conducting a study on the types of food people normally buy at these concerts," he replied. "Which foods they prefer to eat at a concert and which they tend to ignore, as well as taking empirical evidence of the quality of the foods being offered."

Tasha quirked her lips at him and said, "That's a nice excuse to wander around and eat sweets."

"Yeah, and I get to write it off as a business expense, too." He finished up the bit of pastry and wiped off his hands on his shirt, and offered her his hand. "The name's Boston Byrd, by the way."

"Tasha Johnson," she replied, shaking his hand.

"Not to sound trite or anything, but what's a pretty thing like you doing in a place like this?" He chuckled softly.

"My friend suggested that we visit a concert," Tasha replied. "Perhaps she thought it was a different sort of concert."

"An easy enough mistake to make, and I'm sure one which you'd only make once," Boston said wryly.

"They are not so bad," Anastasia put in, coming over to them and munching on some sort of puff pastry Tasha was unfamiliar with. "Their music bears a distinct rhythm and a strain of melodic power flowing through its chords."

"Right," Tasha drawled. She turned thoughtfully to the man and said, "Hmm. Say, Boston, I don't suppose you've heard of anything unusual around here of late, have you?"

Boston barked a laugh. "There are always unusual things happening around here. It's all part of the job."

Tasha chuckled softly and lowered her voice a bit, taking a seat next to him, and said, "I mean, we're looking for someone. Possibly multiple someones. Probably not Pandora Corp employees. Offworld visitors."

"People come through here every day for business and pleasure," Boston said. "You're going to need to be a bit more specific thank that, I'm afraid."

"I probably shouldn't be telling you this, but we're looking for one or more government agents," Tasha said. "They may intend trouble for Pandora Corp. Some segment of the government apparently doesn't like some of the things Pandora is doing, and wants to put a stop to it without bothering to go through the legitimate channels."

Boston's eyes widened, suddenly very much alert. "That's not good. Not good at all. Have you taken this to the higher ups in the corp yet?"

Tasha shook her head. "We don't have any solid evidence for it yet, I'm afraid. Without that, they'd never listen to us anyway. We're left to having to search for information ourselves. They've already killed one man because he tried to put a stop to this and warn somebody about it, and what's worse, they wiped the data on his laptop before we could get to it to find out the specifics of what he even knew."

Boston nodded as he listened to her. "Alright, alright. I'll help in any way I can. I swear, I'm loyal to the corp, not to whatever paranoids in the government want to put a monkey wrench into our projects. Just let me put in my report here about this place real quick and I'll see what I can dig up for you. I'm going to need some more specifics about what to look for, but I just might be able to find something."

"That's great," Tasha said. "Thanks, Boston."

Boston hastily submitted his report via datapad and followed them out of the concert hall back to their ship. The young man seemed genuinely worried about the situation they described, and although he continued to protest that someone higher up should really hear of this, his protests tended to be fairly weak and half-hearted. Perhaps, Tasha thought, the fellow was just bored and wanted to play James Bond for a bit. If he were given a chance to, he'd doubtless outgrow the inclination quite quickly.

"So this is your ship," he said, glancing it over as he climbed aboard and up to the rec room. "What sort of design is it?" Melissa and Jannika did not appear to be around at the moment.

"Oh, a couple of our friends designed it themselves," Tasha said. "A whole custom job, we even helped build it." She smirked faintly and said, "I'd offer you something to eat, but I think you've probably had entirely too many sweets this evening as it is."

Boston chuckled softly and said, "You have a point." He took a seat on the couch. "Alright, ladies. Tell me what you know."

"We were in at Butler Station to do some trading, and while we were there, we were to meet with a friend of our friend, Calen Tran," Tasha said. "He was a Pandora Corp employee. But when we went to see him, he turned up dead. Another friend of his managed to contact us and tell us that he'd been attempting to find help to stop these government agents we mentioned."

"Calen Tran..." Boston mused, pulling out his datapad. "Doesn't ring a bell, but I might be able to find someone who knew him. Hate to hear about a loyal employee being killed in the line of work. Always a sad thing." Boston poked at the hand-held device for a few minutes before saying, "Hmm. According to these records, the last person to speak to him before he left the planet was a scientist by the name of Hui Wang."

"That may well be the lead we're looking for," Tasha said, a grin spreading across her face. "Sounds like a good place to start to me. Where might we be able to find him?"

"East sector, research and development," Boston said. "Visitors aren't allowed in there, so I'll message him to come meet us here instead."

"I shouldn't have to tell you to be discreet about what you put into communications," Tasha said. "We don't know just what these agents have access to and whether or not they'd be able to trace it and see what we're saying on an open channel, or even a corp channel."

"You're right, can't even be certain that the government didn't manage to get onto the corp's private channels," Boston said, sighing. "Right, I'll tell him as little as possible to get him out here, but he might not show up until tomorrow. He's probably already in bed by now."

The hatch below opened and Jannika said as she climbed up the ladder, "Ah, good, you're back. I got a great price on the ore, and have an order coming in tomorrow for some-- Oh, hello. Who's our new friend?" She looked over at Boston with interest and curiosity.

Tasha said, "Ah, Jannika. This is Boston Byrd, of Pandora Corp. Boston, our friend, Jannika Kai."

"Nice to meet you," she said, going over to shake his hand, then glanced at Tasha and said, "So I take it this means you've found something?"

Tasha nodded. "Boston's going to contact the last person who spoke to Calen Tran before he left the planet and get him to come here so we can talk to him. Maybe this Hui Wang fellow will be able to tell us something."

"His name's Hui Wang?" Jannika said, unable to suppress a giggle.

"He's Chinese," Boston said helpfully.

"I figured as much, and I know I shouldn't laugh, but still," Jannika said, giggling again. "Hui Wang..."

"Jannika, dear," Anastasia said gently. "Are you not part Asian yourself?"

"Yeah, my dad's a real pan-Asian mutt," Jannika said. "I can't help it, though! His name's Hui Wang!" She almost fell to the floor giggling, then said, "Okay, I'll stop now."


	19. Investigations

Melissa showed up again around mid-morning, planetary time. Boston had returned home to his own apartment to pick up some things and catch some sleep in the meantime. Tasha and Anastasia were in bed, but Jannika was still awake, however, pacing thoughtfully about the mess hall whilst munching on pastries and drinking coffee. She'd been primarily just talking things over with herself, or to Sleipnir rather, but Sleipnir's responses weren't very interesting just at the moment.

"Ah, there you are, Melissa," Jannika said. "Was wondering if you were going to get in today. Found anything interesting?"

Melissa strode over to the replicator to bring up a plate of ribs and sat down at the table. "I think I've narrowed it down that it may be a single person we're looking for, working alone. And one that isn't particularly subtle or competent, either. I have to wonder why we needed to have worried in the first place." She snorted softly. "Something of a disappointment, really."

"Better than the alternative," Jannika commented. "Of a large number of highly competent individuals to whom you're never certain just how many there are or if you managed to get them all this time."

Melissa shrugged. "Anyway, this person, whoever it was, had their fingers all over everything. Even _you_ could have found the prints they left if you'd been looking."

"Do you know who they are and where they might be yet, though?"

Melissa shook her head. "Not yet. But it shouldn't take me too much longer to pin them down." She speared a bit of carrot with her fork. "Like an insect to a board."

"Tasha and Anastasia found a potential lead, also," Jannika said. "Some scientist fellow with a very silly name." She suppressed a giggle. "He'll be coming over to talk sometime today, most likely."

"Good luck with that," Melissa said. "I'll be heading out to follow up my own leads after I get some sleep."

Melissa finished up her dinner and headed off to her own quarters to sleep. Jannika went and replicated herself another cup of coffee, yawning sleepily to herself. She'd been awake entirely too long, but figured one of them ought to be up and about should Hui decide to turn up. Provided she could avoid giggling at the poor man's name whenever he showed up, anyway.

Boston returned to Sleipnir around noon and found her in the rec room listening to a bit of old rock music, drinking some more coffee, and continuing to pace. He was carrying a small briefcase this time.

"Ah, Boston, hello," Jannika said. "Get everything you needed?"

"All right here," he said, patting the briefcase. "Has Hui shown up yet?"

"Not yet. You want some lunch? Or breakfast, or whatever?"

"Oh, I'd hate to impose or anything, though I haven't eaten yet," Boston said. "There's a nice restaurant nearby that sells the best pancakes, if you want to pop out for a bite to eat. My treat."

Jannika thought about it for a moment, then grinned broadly and said, "Sounds good to me." She glanced upward at nothing in particular and said, "Sleipnir, if Hui shows up, tell him where we went."

"I will do so," Sleipnir replied.

The two of them climbed down the ladder and out of the ship. "Sleipnir is your ship's computer, I take it?" Boston said. "Is it an integrated AI?"

"Yup," Jannika said. "It isn't fully sentient yet, though."

"Yeah, that's always a bit bothersome with AIs. The waiting period while they 'grow up', so to speak," Boston said. "What sort of design did you use?"

"Oh, it was a custom job," Jannika said. "Experimental. It remains to be seen just how well the experiment winds up working in practice. Not planning on selling the design anytime soon, either." She grinned coyly at him.

"I wasn't even thinking of it," Boston said innocently. "Here's the place."

Down the road from the landing area was a large building that had a sign which read 'Interstellar House of Pancakes'. Inside, the place had a nice atmosphere, ambient lighting, and light pop music playing quietly in the background. A young hostess came and seated them in a comfortable booth and brought them menus.

"I take it that your friends are involved... with each other," Boston said. "What about you? Have you got some loving man, woman, or AI waiting for you somewhere?" He grinned crookedly at her.

Jannika chuckled softly. "Afraid not. Well, Loki's a bit questionable on that regard, but he's more like, you know, an uncle to me. Thinking of him as any sort of lover would be really, really odd in my mind. Oh, Loki's this AI who I basically grew up with."

"So where are you from, anyway?" Boston asked.

"Midgard." She glanced up as the waitress arrived and asked for their orders. "I'll have the strawberry pancakes."

"Ditto here," Boston said. The waitress politely took their menus back and headed off again. "At least that's one nice thing about my job. Gives me flexible work hours. So what do you do for a living, when you aren't running around taking on freelance missions?" He grinned crookedly at her.

"Lately, it's been primarily commodity trading," Jannika said. "Buy something one place, fly someplace else, sell it, rinse, repeat."

"A potentially lucrative business if you like travelling. People are always needing things that are in one place to be somewhere else, after all."

The waitress returned shortly with their food, and they proceeded to dig in. "Mm," Jannika said, munching on the pancakes. "You're right, these _are_ good." She wondered if the replicator had the pattern for this particular meal in it.

"Told you," Boston said with a grin.

She felt something brushing against her knee, and noticed that only one of his hands was on the table. His other hand appeared to be attempting to discreetly caress her legs under the table. Jannika snapped her hand under the table and grabbed his wrist, looking him calmly straight in the eyes.

"Don't," she said flatly.

"Sorry?" Boston said. "Ack, you're stronger than you look. Ow, lemme go, please. I swear, it won't happen again."

Jannika released him, and he quickly pulled back his arm and rubbed his wrist. Quietly, she went back to munching on her food as if nothing had happened, though neither of them hardly spoke a word the rest of the meal. When they were done eating, Boston went over and paid the bill and they headed back out to where Sleipnir was parked.

"Sleipnir, has Hui shown up yet?" Jannika asked.

"Negative."

"I'm sure he must have received the message," Boston said. "Though I couldn't make it sound too urgent without potentially attracting unwanted attention."

"It's okay," Jannika said, shrugging and slouching down on the couch. "He'll be around when he's around."

It was almost fourteen hundred hours when Hui Wang arrived at the landing area, knocking hesitantly on the ship's hatch. Sleipnir helpfully said, "There is someone outside knocking on the hatch."

"Hopefully that's Hui," Jannika said, climbing down to the hatch and opening it up for him.

"Hello," said the fellow. "My name is Hui Wang. Did you wish to speak with me?" He was a small man, and very twitchy. He constantly looked nervously from side to side as though in fear of being snuck up upon.

"Yes, we did," Boston said, extending a hand. "I'm Boston Byrd, and this is Jannika Kai."

"Please, come inside, make yourself comfortable," Jannika invited.

Hui came inside, although the part about making himself comfortable was a bit questionable, as he continued to be extremely nervous even as he sat down on the couch in the rec room and made a visible effort to try to relax. It didn't particularly succeed much.

"What was it you wished to speak with me about?" Hui asked. "Your message was somewhat vague, but it sounded like it might be important."

"I understand that you spoke with a Mr. Calen Tran before he left the planet?" Jannika asked.

"Yes, yes, I did," Hui said. "Wait, he left the planet? What happened to him? Where did he go? Is he alright?"

"You didn't even realize he'd gone anywhere?" Jannika said in puzzlement.

"Well, no," Hui said. "I've been awfully busy with work lately and sometimes I wind up forgetting about other things. You know how it goes, I'm sure. I don't tend to pay too much attention to what might be going on outside most of the time."

"What did he say to you before he left?" Jannika asked. "What did you two talk about?"

"Oh, I'd just asked him for some help with one of the projects I've been working on," Hui said. "I don't know what I must have said or done to make him so upset. He just stormed off. I think he was almost looking nervous or terrified. I have no idea why. Was it something I said? Is he alright? He didn't go and do something rash, did he? He was my friend, and I'd hate to think that I caused him any trouble."

"What sort of project was this?" Jannika asked. "Are you refering to the interdimensional gate project?"

"Yes, of course," Hui said. "I needed his particular expertise with calibrating the primary reactor modules, otherwise the thing would have never been able to receive sufficient power to open a trans-dimensional gateway. But he grew very frightened for some reason when he found out exactly what it was I was working on. I am so very confused."

He wasn't the only one who was confused. "Did you hear anything about a government agent trying to shut down your project?"

"No, no," Hui said. "I don't hear things like that. I just stay in and work. I don't listen to rumors."

"Mr.--" Jannika stopped herself, choking back a giggle. "Hui, Calen Tran is dead."

"What!?" Hui sat bolt upright, eyes widening and managing to look even more nervous than he had before. "What happened to him?"

"He was killed on Butler Station, apparently by a government agent wanting to stop him from getting help," Jannika said. "He was trying to contact me when he died. But as he died before I could meet with him, I didn't know precisely what all he wanted to tell me."

"I don't understand," Hui said. "Why would the government want to kill Calen? He was a great guy! Always willing to help out a friend when needed, whether with technical or person matters. He was going to be my best man at my wedding, up until my fiancee called it off at the last minute. And now you tell me he's dead? This is horrible!"

Boston reached out a hand to him. "Calm down, Hui. We're going to get to the bottom of this, I promise you."

"What did he say to you before he left?" Jannika asked.

"He was very upset," Hui said. "He said that we didn't know what we were doing, what we were getting into, and that it would come to no good. He apologized for yelling at me, though, and said he had to think about things. Then he didn't come back."

Jannika scratched her head in puzzlement for a moment. Something here didn't quite add up. Was Hui mistaken, or had Melissa not been fully forthcoming in what she'd said to them? She heard a door from below and glanced aside as she heard someone coming up the ladder. It was Anastasia.

"Hello," Anastasia said politely to them. "We have guests? Ah, you must be Mr. Hui Wang, then?"

"That is correct," Hui said.

"Nastya, we need to talk," Jannika said quietly aside to her. She glanced at the men and said, "Excuse us for a moment." She led Anastasia onto the bridge. Loki was still sitting there where she'd left him on the console.

"What is it, Jannika?" Anastasia asked.

"There's something not quite right here," Jannika said. "Hui says that Calen was upset about the gate, that he seemed to not like the idea of it and he ran off because of what he'd seen there."

"What are you getting at?"

"I think Melissa might have lied to us." Jannika reached up and rubbed her forehead.

"It is not inconceivable," Loki said. "But whether she did or not, would you wish to let Pandora Corp go through with building the gate, or attempt to stop them, regardless?"

"You have a point," Jannika said. "But can we really trust Melissa or not?"

Anastasia furrowed her brow. "We will need to be cautious."

"Think on this," Loki said. "If she did lie to you, she would have had a good reason for it. What was this reason? And why did she help us out on Butler Station? She obviously went to great trouble, not to mention expense, to help us out, and for what? If it wasn't because she was actually Calen's friend, this brings into question her whole motivation. Did she specifically target _us_ just to help stop Pandora's gate from being shut down? There would have been far better people to get for that."

"Personally, I'm inclined to be extremely grateful to someone who actually helped us out over someone who I spoke with occasionally over the internet," Jannika said dryly. "And if she lied to us, well, it was probably a lot easier to explain and get us to trust her than the truth."

"The question of the moment, however, is... What is the truth?" Anastasia said.

"Obviously, she wants to keep the gate project going," Jannika said. "And I doubt she works for Pandora Corp."

"Maybe she is also from another universe originally," Anastasia suggested. "And she became trapped here like I and Tasha and wants to be able to leave again."

"This is possible," Jannika said. "We'll need to keep an eye on her, but for the moment, I'm hardly about to go throwing her off the ship or anything. I _am_ grateful for her springing us from jail. That's definitely worth something in my book. Loki, is there anything you can find out about who she is or where she's from?"

"Not very much," Loki said. "From a facial check, I've determined that her full name is Melissa Omega."

"Omega?" Jannika said, raising an eyebrow. "Aren't Greek alphabet names reserved for use by gene-engineered people?"

"Correct," Loki said. "Which, so far as I can tell, appears to be the case. Of course, it may also be a fair excuse to not have any parents listed, either. Not like anyone's ever pulled _that_ before or anything."

"Nastya," Jannika said, turning to her. "See to our guests, get them lunch or whatever. I'm going to have to see about doing some digging. If Calen Tran was not actually worried about a saboteur, they're a dead end so far as that line of investigation goes. But I want to get to the bottom of all this."

Anastasia nodded to her. "I shall keep them occupied while you do that." She headed off back to the rec room again.

Jannika, with Loki's help, proceeded to dive into her own little investigation. She hated not knowing things, and would be far, far more comfortable if she knew precisely what was going on. It was never good, after all, to be not entirely certain just where one might be standing at any given time.


	20. Motivations

Hui went off again shortly back to work, somehow even more nervous than he had been when he arrived, but Boston stuck around for the moment. Anastasia had to wonder just how long they were going to manage to keep hiding the existence of the replicator from him. It didn't take long for Jannika to return from the bridge, either, grumbling about Loki sending her to bed again. Anastasia always had to chuckle about that, and how she so readily allowed herself to be bossed around by the cute little AI.

"So, Russian, are you?" Boston said conversationally. "How'd you get involved in this little operation, anyway?"

"Oh, I merely fell into the role, so to speak," Anastasia said with a grin.

"So are you and Tasha really, you know..." Boston made some inexplicable gestures.

Anastasia raised an eyebrow at him. "If you are wondering if she is my lover, then you would be correct. Is that a problem, Mr. Byrd?"

"No, no," Boston said, waving a hand. "And please, call me Boston. Mr. Byrd is so formal."

"I prefer formality, if it is all the same to you, Mr. Byrd," Anastasia said.

"If you say so," Boston said with a shrug.

Sleipnir's voice broke into the awkward conversation, saying, "Sorry to interrupt, but Hui Wang is outside again. Shall I let him in?"

"Yes, please," Anastasia said. Down below, she heard the sounds of the hatch opening, then quickly closing again and the small Chinese man climbing hastily up the stairs. "Back so soon, Mr. Wang?"

"Help! She's trying to kill me!" cried Hui.

"Who is?" Anastasia wondered, raising an eyebrow. Was Melissa up to trouble or something?

"A crazy woman in blue and yellow spandex," Hui said frantically. "Um... White, brown hair, was wearing a mask, wielding a sonic blade." Not Melissa, then.

"I didn't realize spandex was in fashion this decade," Boston commented. "Do I need to contact the fashion design department for a change in marketing?"

Anastasia said, "Did she follow you here?"

"Damn near chased me all the way from the east sector," Hui said. "She might even still be outside as we speak. I think I might have lost her on the last stretch of that, though. I wasn't exactly stopping to constantly look behind me or anything."

"Sleipnir, do your sensors pick up anyone matching his description nearby?" Anastasia asked.

"Negative," Sleipnir replied.

"I suppose that you managed to lose her, then," Anastasia said to Hui. "Sleipnir, can you find any information about anyone matching the description Hui gave?"

"Negative," Sleipnir repeated. "That information is classified."

"One moment," Anastasia said to the men, and headed onto the bridge. "Loki, any chance of hacking into the classified information about this spandex-clad woman who attacked Hui?"

"I'll see what I can do, babe," Loki replied. "If it's government work, it might be a tougher nut to crack than usual, especially without leaving any tracks. I'm far more subtle than Melissa gives me credit for! Really!"

Anastasia smirked. "Just be careful, please? The last thing we need is to piss off the galactic government, too."

"I'll keep that in mind." Loki chuckled softly.

Anastasia headed back to the rec room. "Sleipnir, please notify us if you detect the aforementioned individual anywhere nearby."

"Acknowledged," Sleipnir said.

Boston rubbed his forehead. "When you said that there was a government agent out to try to shut down the gate project, I didn't think you meant one with delusions of superheroism."

"I had not anticipated this turn of events, either," Anastasia admitted. "Perhaps, considering that there has already been an attempt made upon your life, Mr. Wang, it would be best for you to remain here for the time being."

"Wild horses could not get me away at the moment," Hui said dryly. "I'll stay here where it's nice and safe. And you guys better keep me safe, or I'll come back and haunt you."

"Do not worry, Mr. Wang," Anastasia said to him, reaching out to put a hand on his shoulder reassuringly. "We shall protect you to the best of our ability."

"I think maybe I should stay here for the moment, too," Boston said. "This all's making me really nervous, and while she's not out to get me, so far as I know, I'm not wanting to take any chances here."

"We have two unused crew cabins and plenty of supplies in the ship if you want to stay here for the time being," Anastasia said. "Here, I shall show you to them."

Tasha emerged from her quarters that evening and found Anastasia in the mess hall munching on some cheese and crackers and chatting absently with Sleipnir. "Evening, Nastya. So, did I miss anything of interest?"

"Well," Anastasia said. "We discovered that Melissa may not have been entirely forthcoming with us in her intentions. It appears that Mr. Calen Tran was not, in fact, afraid of government agents shutting down the gate, but instead horrified about the gate's existence. On the other hand, a possible government agent wearing spandex attacked our informant, who barely managed to make it back here."

Tasha blinked a bit. "You know, I really need to work out that entire daylight thing. Everything interesting happens when I'm asleep."

Anastasia chuckled softly and leaned over to kiss her. "Yes, you do. But that is alright."

"Alistair knew the secret of it," Tasha said. "But he never saw fit to share it with me. Not, mind you, that I had exactly in any way earned it yet at the time either. Or probably not even now, anyway."

The door slid open, and Melissa strolled into the mess hall and over to the replicator for a cup of hot coffee and a plate of omelettes. "Evening," she said. "Did you folks learn anything of use while I was asleep?" From her tone, she clearly would be surprised if they had.

"There's a woman in yellow and blue spandex attempting to kill a nervous Chinese scientist," Anastasia said matter-of-factly.

Melissa's fork paused on the way to her mouth and she just looked at Anastasia. "What?"

"We suspect that this individual might be the government agent you have been searching for," Anastasia said.

"It would certainly fit the profile, from what little I could find, but still," Melissa said. "Run this by me again, and start from the top this time."

"That fellow we mentioned who knew Calen," Anastasia explained. "He came here, went back to work, then came back here quite frantically when this crazy woman came up and tried to kill him. He's down in the crew cabins if you want to talk to him. He might not have gotten to sleep yet. We had no luck in finding out any further information about her, as the information appears to be classified."

"Do tell me that your bumbling didn't alert the government to our presence as well," Melissa said dryly.

"I did tell Loki to be more cautious than usual," Anastasia said.

"We're doomed," Melissa said lightly. "I don't suppose you have any idea where this super hero wannabe got off to at the moment, do you?"

"Sorry," Anastasia said, shaking her head.

"Great," Melissa muttered. "Okay, I'm going to go out investigating again. If she happens to come back here, notify me at once. And try not to get yourselves killed or anything. It would be positively embarrassing to get killed by someone in brightly colored spandex."

"We'll try not to get killed or anything, I'm sure," Tasha said with a smirk. "Good luck."

Still shaking her head, Melissa finished eating and headed outside again. Anastasia murmured after she was gone, "One might think that she were not truly intending to deceive us into a false friendship for how insulting she has frequently been."

Sure enough, however, arond midnight, Sleipnir's sensors detected the oddly-clad individual skulking about the landing area, and he helpfully projected the image on the viewscreen for Tasha and Anastasia. She didn't appear to know quite what she was looking for at first, peering over first one ship then another. Taking Melissa's advice to heart, Anastasia pulled out her wrist-comm and tapped it to contact her.

"Anastasia here," she said. "The individual in question is examining the landing area most intently."

"I'm on my way," came Melissa's reply. "Keep her occupied until I get there if you can, I'm kind of in the middle of something here."

"We shall endeavor to," Anastasia said, then looked over to Tasha. "Do you believe she will locate the correct ship? She may have intercepted Mr. Byrd's message to Mr. Wang."

"I wouldn't bet on the alternative," Tasha said dryly. "Look, there she goes."

The female on the viewscreen came around and finally located the ship she was looking for, and began to poke around outside of Sleipnir. She was even wearing a blue cape and a partial face mask. Anastasia had to wonder how frequently she had issues with the cape getting caught in things inadvertently.

"That sonic blade of hers looks tough," Tasha commented.

"She might begin attempting to force her way through the hull," Anastasia mused. "Or at least trying to pry open the hatch."

"I've an idea," Tasha said. "Sleipnir, unlock the main hatch, but keep the other doors locked _except_ the one leading into the cargo hold. If she goes in there, seal and lock that door behind her."

"Acknowledged and understood," Sleipnir replied.

"Loki, can you analyze that weapon of hers? Any way to disable it from here?" Anastasia asked.

"Singing," Loki replied simply. "Flood the chamber with white noise -- or powertwitch music, for that matter -- and she won't be able to remodulate it properly. It'll remain an ordinary blade."

It was almost too easy, as the woman climbed aboard the ship and grinned broadly as she got inside, and after seeing the other doors locked, headed straight into the cargo hold and got stuck there. Once inside, the speakers in the cargo hold promptly began blaring Epileptic Trees music at high volume. The woman began what might have been cursing from her body movements, but it was impossible to hear anything over the music.

"So what made you believe she would walk straight into a trap that should be fairly obvious to anyone with half a brain?" Anastasia wondered.

"Because she doesn't have half a brain," Tasha replied. "From Melissa's description, it didn't sound like she was entirely there insofar as the mental capacity. She might not be a complete _idiot_ , but she clearly thinks she's far more clever than she really is and the only reason she's gotten this far is because she has government backing, otherwise she'd never wind up getting anywhere."

"Ah," Anastasia said. "So you are more experienced in dealing with the consequences of stupidity?" She grinned wryly at Tasha.

Tasha smirked back at her and just said, "Something like that."

Anastasia tapped her wrist-comm and said, "We have her trapped in the cargo hold."

"Thanks," Melissa replied over the comm. "I'll be there in a moment."

Anastasia went over to one of the bridge terminals and typed a text message to appear on the terminal in the cargo hold. "So, do you have a lame superhero name to go along with the costume?"

Tasha looked over to what she was doing and quirked an eyebrow. "Baiting the prisoner now?"

"Curious," Anastasia replied.

The captive glanced over to the terminal and went over to type a reply. "My name is Tharpie. Let me out of here."

"Tharpie? Not much of a name, is it? And why should I let you out? You were attempting to murder one of my friends."

"I'm on official business," Tharpie typed. "If you don't release me immediately, I will send a message to friends in high places and you will be in serious trouble."

"Not much of a threat," Anastasia typed back. "Considering that the government is not even supposed to be doing this sort of thing. I bet they will merely conveniently refuse to acknowledge your existence since you managed to bungle and get into trouble."

Tharpie paused for a long moment and stared at the screen. "Fuck you," she typed.

Anastasia chuckled softly in amusement. "Such language!" she typed back. "So, while you're stuck there, care to tell me just why the government wants to shut down the Pandora's gate project?"

"Not particularly," Tharpie typed. "That's classified, of course."

"How about if you talk, I'll turn off the music and switch to white noise instead?"

"This is cruel and unusual. But fine. The government, and rightly so I will add, thinks that this project is far too dangerous to carry through on. You never know what might come through from other dimensions. It could be monsters or demons, or sinister aliens with the intent on taking over the universe. Or sinister humans, for that matter."

"You are quite right, of course," Anastasia replied, switching over the noise as she had promised. "Although I would be hard-pressed to describe myself as 'sinister'. But you see, it is already too late. Their previous attempts have already started to weaken the boundaries between this universe and the rest. Things may begin to slip through regardless and further weaken it. The gateway will merely speed the process. How would your government feel if they believed themselves safe from interdimensional interference, only to discover that such has been happening directly under their noses, and they had no idea to watch for it?"

Tharpie stared at the screen for several minutes, her face dropping, and she leaned back against the wall next to it, putting her face into her hand. She slid down to the floor, and she might have been muttering to herself, but it would have been impossible to make out any words through the noise.

"Melissa has returned," Sleipnir said. "Shall I let her in?"

"Go ahead," Tasha said.

Melissa came inside and climbed up to the bridge, peering over at the image on the viewscreen. "What did you do, depress her into surrender or something? She looks positively emo."

"I gave her a clear view of reality," Anastasia said. "And explained in no uncertain terms the hopelessness of the situation in general."

"Congratulations," Melissa said dryly. "You're depressing."

"So now that we've got her, what are we going to do with her?" Tasha wondered.

"Leave that to me, if you will," Melissa said. "I'll deal with her."

"Alright," Tasha said. "Sleipnir, let Melissa into the cargo hold."

"Acknowledged."

Tasha nodded to her, and Melissa gave a disturbing sort of grin and headed out and down there. When the door to the cargo hold open, Tharpie looked up and sprang to her feet, whipping out her sonic blade with inhuman speed. Anastasia could scarcely follow the blur of movements as Melissa rapidly closed the distance, but Tharpie was already flipping out of the way. A quick strike up with the sonic blade, and one of the speakers was damaged badly enough to stop emitting noise.

"Sleipnir, seal the cargo hold," Anastasia said. "Make certain that she cannot escape."

"What about Melissa?" Tasha asked.

"She can take care of herself. She wished to deal with the culprit herself, after all." Anastasia stared at the screen. "I merely wish that I could follow their movements better. They are extremely quick."

"At least I didn't order anything easily breakable."

On the screen, the two women were circling one another and bouncing around wildly. From the flash of a grin on Melissa's face, she could almost think that the woman was enjoying this and was merely toying with Tharpie. Another bounce brought Tharpie's blade into the second speaker, with a crackle and a fizzle canceling the silencing white noise in the room. Anastasia flipped a switch to turn on the sound intake from the rooms so they might hear what was going on there.

Tharpie began to sing wordlessly, the sonic blade in her hands humming to life. "You won't stop me this time, Shadowcrawler! Just wait till my employers have your head on a pike!"

"Oh, please," Melissa said. She shot out some sort of weapon that caught Tharpie around the ankle. It appeared to be some sort of lasso. "Spare me your drivel. If I'd known it was you who was behind this, I wouldn't have wasted so much time trying to track you down. You're too pathetic to have succeeded in your mission anyway."

"Why you..." Tharpie snarled, then yelped as Melissa gave a yank and pulled her feet out from under her. The sonic blade flew out of her hands and clattered to the floor. Frantically, Tharpie tried to reach for it again.

"Don't even," Melissa said, kicking the blade away. "I think this shall be our final encounter, Banshee."

"Fuck you," Tharpie said.

"You wish." In moments, Melissa had the struggling Tharpie tied hand and foot, and dragged her out of the cargo hold. She returned to the bridge without her moments after.

"Where'd you put the nutcase?" Tasha asked.

"In my quarters," Melissa said. "Her weapon's a custom job, so it might fetch a good price, unless one of you has the bizarre inclination to learn how to use a sonic blade."

"What are you planning on doing with her?" Anastasia asked. "And why did she call you Shadowcrawler?"

"It's a long story," Melissa said. "And I'll do with her whatever I please."

"I take it you have had some previous acquaintance with the woman?" Anastasia said.

"You could say that," Melissa replied. "But I'd rather not go into it just now. Don't worry, you won't need to deal with _her_ again."

"I want to know what you're going to do with her too," Tasha put in.

"I'm going to torture her slowly for fun and then kill her," Melissa said flatly. "You happy now, or would you have rather not known about that?" She smirked broadly at them.

"That's fine, just fine," Tasha said lightly. "I'd just rather people not be trying to deceive me or outright lying to me."

Melissa snorted softly. "You're an idealist."

"Not so much as I've been in the past," Tasha said. "But I'd prefer that those who would be my friends be honest with me, no matter what they're doing. I might be more forgiving of that than of deception."

"I'll be sure to keep that in mind," Melissa said. "Was there anything else, or shall I go play with my new toy a bit?"

"Go right ahead," Tasha said, waving her off. Melissa chuckled softly and inclined her head toward them, and headed off.

"Why did you do that?" Anastasia asked after she was gone.

"I wanted to see if she was going to come clean on her own. Guess we saw the answer to that one."

"Do we really wish to allow her to torture one who believed she was attempting to do the right thing for the good of the universe, whatever her unorthodox style of doing about it?"

Tasha made a helpless gesture. "Do you really think you could stop her, anyway? Look, we might be able to get the jump on her and take her down, _maybe_ , but she's far better trained and more skilled and experienced than the rest of us put together. What are we going to do, lock her in her cabin and try to starve her to death and hope she doesn't figure out a way out, get pissed off about it and kill us all?"

"You have a point," Anastasia said, sighing.

"At the moment, I'd prefer her to be honest than nice. I just wish I knew what she might do now that she's got what she was looking for, but it doesn't look like she's immediately going anywhere in the near future."

"I still dislike the idea," Anastasia said. It bothered her more than she particularly cared to admit, in fact. "How can you be so casual about death and suffering?"

"If we hadn't been here, do you think she would have done otherwise?" Tasha asked. "Doubtful. She'd have still managed to track Tharpie down and catch her one way or another."

"This happening on our ship makes it seem as though we condone this sort of thing, however."

"Look, regardless of her misguided attempt at being a hero, Tharpie is our enemy. She was working at cross-purposes to what we were trying to achieve. And Melissa may very well be a valuable asset in the future if we can keep her on our side. The same could not possibly have been said about Tharpie."

"Is that really all this is to you?" Anastasia said softly. "About achieving your own goals and using people as pawns for your own desires?"

Tasha looked away and stared at the floor for several long moments, before replying quietly, "No. It isn't." She shook her head and looked up again. "I'm not going to fall into that trap."

"Good," Anastasia said, going over to hug her reassuringly. "I worry about you at times, you realize."

"Why?"

"Doing all the right things for all the wrong reasons can be equally as bad as doing the wrong things for the right reasons. I merely wished to ensure that you knew why you were doing things, and that you were doing them for the right reasons."

Tasha smiled crookedly at her. "Don't worry."

Loki put in abruptly, "Uh, I hate to interrupt this touching conversation, but... Worry."

"What?" Tasha said in confusion, turning to the brightly colored box.

"I can't get Sleipnir to respond. He's behaving oddly and is starting to take off on his own."

"Ah crap," Tasha muttered.


	21. Mousetrap

"Is there any way to regain control and turn the engines around?" Tasha wondered.

"I'm trying, I'm trying," Loki said. "This isn't Sleipnir, though. He's being controlled by some outside force that managed to hack into him and get such a solid foothold that I can't shake it. Someone must have been working for quite a while and very quietly for me to have not noticed this already."

"Where, precisely, is it taking us?" Anastasia asked.

"I won't know until we hit hyperspace," Loki said. "I can't get back into the controls!"

"Shit," Tasha muttered. "And Boston and Hui are still on board, too. We promised to keep them safe, and this was not what they'd signed up for."

"I doubt there was anything you could have done to prevent this that I could not have, and it entirely slipped beneath my perception. There must be an AI behind this, and a very _good_ one."

"Wake up Jannika and get her up here," Tasha said, slumping into one of the chairs.

"Ugh, even the _internal_ comm systems are down," Loki said. "At least the doors aren't being controlled, nor the replicators or lights."

"I will go and get her," Anastasia offered. She leaned down to give Tasha a reassuring peck on the forehead and headed out of the bridge.

Tasha rubbed her eyes, and stared off at the screen showing them flying out from Pandora's atmosphere and into space. Just when she had thought things were going more or less well, things started spiraling radically out of control. She didn't like the feeling of not being in control.

The doors slid open again and Jannika and Anastasia stepped onto the bridge. "What in Tyr's good hand is going on here?" Jannika demanded, striding onto the bridge and up toward the front consoles.

"I believe an external AI has taken control of the ship," Loki said. "And it's taking us away from planet Pandora for whatever reason. Once we reach hyperspace, I may be able to figure out where."

"Great," Jannika muttered. "Just bloody peachy."

The image on the viewscreen seemed to split for a moment, and space around them warped and opened up to swallow the ship whole into hyperspace. The shining brilliance of the other side filled the view, blinding and numbing.

"If this trajectory is correct, we're heading for Tanaka Station," Loki said.

"Where is that?" Tasha asked. "What's there?"

"Twenty-six lightyears from planet Pandora," Loki said, bringing diagrams and images of it on his screen. "A small station, only a handful of personnel. It's the personal home of Dr. Susan Tanaka, an expert in the field of artificial intelligence."

"Well, that would explain how something managed to take over the ship," Jannika said dryly. "But why would anyone want to? Why us?"

"She must have found out about Sleipnir," Tasha said. "Or our technology. But how? I doubt Peon would have said anything, and we were careful not to let the Pandorans know about it. The only person who isn't on this bridge right now who knows about it is..."

"Melissa," Anastasia finished.

"Helvíti," Jannika uttered. "We'd realized she was hiding something, but I didn't think it was something like this. The whole business with that agent entirely threw me."

"She found the agent," Tasha said. "She's downstairs with her now."

"Well, that might be why this Susan Tanaka decided to strike now," Jannika said. "If they'd wanted this agent out of the way first. And I suppose there's no way to get control of the ship back, either."

"I've been trying, but no luck," Loki said. "The AI involved is much stronger than me. Moira is her name. I can't get much information about her, though."

"Keep trying," Tasha said.

"Please keep trying to get through to Sleipnir," Anastasia said. "I can only imagine that this was primarily possible due to the fact that he is not yet fully sentient."

"You'd be correct," Loki said. "It's damned near impossible to really take over the core functions of a fully sentient AI."

"In the meantime," Jannika said. "Why don't we go have a little chat with our friend Melissa, then?"

She strode purposefully toward the doors, leaving Tasha and Anastasia to follow in her wake as she climbed down the stairs and entered the crew quarters. Jannika didn't even bother to knock or ring, simply opening the door, to reveal Tharpie strung up, naked and gagged, looking slightly worse for wear. Melissa was standing over her with a riding crop in hand.

"I need to quit doing that," Jannika muttered.

"I was just getting warmed up," Melissa told her brightly. "Did you girls want to watch the festivities?"

"No, Melissa," Jannika said. "We just wanted to have a little chat. Primarily about the fact that the ship is no longer under our control and we're heading for Tanaka Station."

"Oh, that," Melissa said, smirking. "Don't worry too much about it. If my employer had wanted you girls dead, you'd already be."

"We figured as much," Tasha said dryly.

"Maybe you could enlighten us as to what she _does_ want, then," Jannika said. "Though I can guess."

"If you're guessing what I think you're probably guessing, then your guessing is probably correct," Melissa said. "She already knew you girls had some interesting technology even before she assigned me to come aboard. You weren't exactly particularly subtle in your flight plan. In fact, if it hadn't been for her and Moira's help, the lot of you would probably have been in even deeper trouble. She helped to keep the authorities off your backs, you know. Despite your own best efforts at getting yourselves arrested, anyway."

"She's been helping us?" Jannika repeated, raising an eyebrow. "And is there any particular reason why she didn't just, you know, ask?"

Melissa smirked. "You know as well as I do that you'd not so readily give it up just like that, so don't even bother pretending that you might have had you been asked. If you were going to, you'd have tried to see how much money you could get for it out of Pandora Corp."

"You realize that Boston and Hui are still aboard," Tasha said.

"That's not my concern. Dr. Tanaka doesn't much care about the crew, though she might just offer them, and you, employment opportunities," Melissa said.

"I'm not interested in any employment opportunities from the likes of someone who does things like this," Jannika said.

"Hey, don't knock it. The pay's good, there's plenty of side benefits, and I seriously doubt she'd be planning on letting you go with what you know anyway."

"Well, we'll be there in two days," Jannika said. "If there's anything else you'd care to come clean on, feel free to do so. Because I really don't care anymore." Jannika spun on her heel and headed back to the ladder.

Melissa smirked at Tasha once Jannika was gone, and said, "When people say things like that, they _do_ , they really _do_."

"Probably," Tasha said. "Have fun." She turned and closed the door, and headed out along with Anastasia back upstairs.

The three of them gathered up in the mess hall and replicated some food for Jannika and Anastasia, which they sat down to eat half-heartedly. Tasha slouched down in a chair and stared off, wondering just what in the world they were going to do about all this, and figuring that the other two were probably thinking about the same thing.

"Well, we've been caught up nicely in this little thing," Tasha said. "Recriminating ourselves about that we should have been more cautious is probably a moot point by this point, but really, what more could we have done? We were screwed the minute the cops showed up at the Kai house."

"We could have attempted to be more patient and have earned the money legitimately and actually bought the supplies rather than stealing them?" Anastasia suggested.

"That might have taken years," Jannika said.

"Right, we're all young and impulsive, and more than a little impatient at times," Tasha said. "But sometimes you have to bring things into perspective. What would the passing of years matter if you're going to live forever anyway? I've certainly no intention of letting either of you die if I can possibly help it. And here we've put ourselves in danger being reckless about this all."

"Patience can be a scarce thing when you're twenty-something," Jannika commented wryly.

"We should be spending those years learning and growing more skilled and experienced," Tasha said. "Not flying off on some wild chase for the sake of survival and almost getting ourselves killed on more than one occasion."

Anastasia raised her hand to still Tasha's tirade for the moment. "There is one point that you are not considering, Tasha. Pandora Corp. They have already begun work on their gateway. This _is_ a time-sensitive issue. There will, indeed, be time to attempt to find a stretch of peace and quiet in order to learn, and to earn our place in the multiverse, but at the moment, we have a gateway looming over our heads and we cannot leave this universe until we have that warp coil. Neither do we know what, precisely, might happen or come out of it should Pandora successfully complete this project."

"Alright, you have a point," Tasha said. "Of course, it leads back to the point that we wouldn't have required a new warp coil in the first place if I had spent more time learning to fly a damned ship rather than waste my time on pointless pursuits, but that's neither here nor there at the moment."

Jannika popped the last bit of chicken into her mouth and said, "Alright, enough of this. I'm going to the bridge and see if I can manage to come up with some information and maybe some sort of plan to get us out of this. And you know, if working for Susan Tanaka is the best thing we can come up with, at this point, it might well be safer and more sane to just do it rather than try to fight it. There's all the time in the universe to escape, as Tasha says. I think we all could stand to learn a little patience at this point, I suppose."

She headed out the door to the bridge, leaving the other two alone in the mess hall. After a few minutes, Melissa strolled into the mess hall and over to the replicator after dropping a wad of slightly bloody tissue into the recycler. Tasha glanced over at her and raised an eyebrow, absently wondering if she should even try to think about just what the woman was up to down there. What a waste of perfectly good blood, too. After replicating herself a bowl of tortilla chips and some salsa, she sat down at the table with them.

"Want some?" Melissa offered generously, waving her hand at the snacks.

"No, thank you," Tasha said. Anastasia, however, eagerly reached for some.

"You know, it's funny," Melissa said, munching on a tortilla chip. "In all the time I've been travelling with you girls, I don't think I've ever actually seen you eat, Tasha."

"I'd really rather not," Tasha said, her heart sinking. This was not a line of questioning she particularly cared to get into at the moment.

"Do you even have a stomach, or do you just plug yourself into the wall to recharge every now and then?" Melissa wondered.

"Something along those lines," Tasha replied. All the better if Melissa thought she was a cyborg of some sort. The truth was far too dangerous.

"I have to wonder just how good your design really is," Melissa said. "Where do you stack up against me?"

"I'm a lover, not a fighter," Tasha said with a smirk. "You'd still kick my ass."

"Why don't we find out?" Melissa stood up and headed around the table. "See how far your highly advanced technology really takes you."

"I'd really rather not..." Tasha began, but Melissa was already upon her, pulling her out of her seat. Anastasia grabbed the bowl of chips and carried it off safely out of harm's way.

Melissa was strong and quick, but more importantly she knew her way around a fight. Tasha struggled against her, not particularly wanting to fight or to hurt Melissa, but not really seeing any way around it at this point. She tried to squirm free of her, to pin her down or otherwise disable her, but the woman was just as fast as she was and probably even stronger.

"Melissa, let go," Tasha said through clenched teeth. "Leave me alone!"

Melissa, however, was relentless and not willing to back off for even a moment. There was no real malice in her eyes, rather a somewhat sadistic grin of merely enjoying the fight itself. Tasha was no real fighter, but she felt the fight stirring in her, and she snarled back at her. Melissa was hurting her, and on the verge of breaking something. Any mortal would have wound up severely bruised after a fight like this, and sore for a week or more.

"Come on, fight back, I know you've got it in you," Melissa said, redoubling her efforts tirelessly.

"Leave me _alone_!" Tasha growled, viciously lashing out at her.

Unable to help herself, Tasha extended her fangs and plunged them into Melissa's wrist, eagerly drinking of the other's sweet blood. Reason might try to tell her she shouldn't be doing this, but at the moment, reason was a distant, quiet voice in her mind. Melissa stopped struggling at that, and by the time Tasha got control of herself again and pulled herself away, she realized that she had drunk more blood than a normal human could survive losing at one time. Damn it, she hadn't intended to kill the woman, no matter how unhappy they'd been with her at the moment. In alarm, she checked and saw that Melissa was still actually conscious, and had started chuckling softly. Either not that badly hurt, or worse than she had thought.

"That, I was not expecting," Melissa said.

"Melissa, are you alright?" Tasha asked in concern.

"I'm fine, I'm fine," Melissa assured her. "I _am_ a cyborg, if you haven't noticed that by now. I'd need to lose a lot more blood than that to be in serious trouble." She climbed to her feet again and brushed herself off. Anastasia brought the chips back to the table and sat them down again, and Melissa took one and scooped up a good helping of salsa and started munching on it. "So, tell me, then. Just what exactly _are_ you?"

"I'm a vampire," Tasha admitted, slumping down into one of the seats across from them.

"So I gathered," Melissa said. "Bit more details, please? Did your universe genetically engineer people resembling the vampires of legend, or is it accomplished with cybernetic implants, or are you really not human and just some bloodsucking humanoid that happens to resemble humans, or are you _literally_ a vampire like out of legends?"

"The latter," Tasha said with a smirk. "I was born human, got turned into a vampire a few years ago, and now I have a severe sun allergy and a liquid diet. I _was_ trying to avoid too many people finding out about it, for reasons that should probably be pretty obvious."

Melissa chuckled softly. "I can imagine... even moreso than trying to keep your technology quiet, and you've succeeded a good deal more with this."

"How the hell did I manage to beat you, anyway?"

"That bit just kind of took me by surprise," Melissa said. "You're pretty damned quick, too. You don't seem to have the amazing super strength and powers and such of the old legendary vampires, either."

"I'm not a very old vampire," Tasha replied. "All that would have come with time and learning, but right here and right now, I don't really have any other vampires around to learn from, either. So I'm just kind of left with making my own way and using what I've already learned and doing what comes instinctively. Not to mention that there's plenty I could yet learn that isn't a strictly vampiric power."

"You just haven't gotten around to learning most of them yet," Melissa pointed out.

"Well, yeah," Tasha said. "I've been a bit busy spending most of my time running from one thing or another because I have no hope in hell of being able to fight it and survive."

"I'd think that's when you'd be working to train the _most_ , rather than lounging about the ship and wasting time."

Tasha smirked broadly. "Fine, you have something of a point there," she admitted. "Not, mind you, that I likely have any hope in hell against your employer, either."

"Tsk," Melissa said, shaking her head. "You doom yourself before you even begin by assuming any effort would end in failure. Look, Tanaka's smart, yes, and she's got a lot of resources on her side, but at the base of it all, she's just human. Just an ordinary, unmodified human. She's not anything special, and she's not even a psychic or anything."

"Why are you telling us this?" Tasha wondered, raising an eyebrow.

"Just making a point," Melissa said lightly, smiling. "I wouldn't _dream_ of betraying my employer, after all. That's just bad for business, you know?"

"Yeah, because if you had, we wouldn't be in this predicament."

"A contract is a contract," Melissa said. "That doesn't mean I might not enjoy watching should things become interesting."

"You don't like her overmuch, do you," Tasha said dryly.

"I wouldn't dare speak any ill word about my employer while still working for her," Melissa said, shaking her head. "We'll see what comes out of it and who really winds up on top. Personally, I don't think you folks stand a chance in hell against her and you'd do best to just surrender and do whatever she wants you to. Unless you can get your act together and figure out what you're doing, she _will_ pound you into the ground."

"I'm sure," Tasha said.

"Oh, and now she'll know about the vampire bit, too. I'm sure she will be _most_ interested in learning all she can about _that_."

"Great," Tasha muttered. "Right, any chance I could pay you to keep quiet about that?" She smirked.

"Sorry, one contract at a time," Melissa said brightly. "And I've seen your finances. You have no chance of outbidding Tanaka either."

"So what would _you_ suggest we do, then?" Tasha said.

"Just curl up and roll over," Melissa said. "I'm sure Tanaka will be merciful. She's never one for carelessly killing someone who might still be useful to her, after all."

"Thanks," Tasha said dryly.

Melissa munched down on the last of the chips and shoved the remaining bit of salsa into the recycler. She stepped over to the replicator and began poking through its database a bit, and called up a number of interesting objects with purposes Tasha did not particularly care to think too closely about. With those in hand, she headed off back down to the crew quarters again.

"I am so fucked," Tasha muttered quietly at Anastasia once she'd gone.

"Perhaps we should take her up on her advice," Anastasia suggested. "The advice which she did _not_ explicitly state, that is. I get the impression that she does not particularly like her present employer, but she would not dare act directly against her."

"We'll be there in less than two days," Tasha said. "What could we possibly teach ourselves in that time?"

"You would be surprised at what the human mind is capable of when properly motivated," Anastasia said.


	22. Pins and Needles

Sleipnir flew in to a small station orbitting a gas giant. The ship set down in a docking area, and the hatch popped open on its own to allow the crew and passengers to exit. Reluctantly, they headed for the door to meet their captor.

Susan Tanaka was not an impressive person at first glance, a slight woman with subdued Asian features and short-cropped blonde hair. She wore a service jumpsuit and a utility belt, to the point where if Tasha hadn't known this was actually her, she might have mistaken her for merely a random worker of some sort aboard the station.

"Ah, greetings, and welcome to Tanaka Station," Susan said. "I am Dr. Susan Tanaka, the administrator of this station. I hope that you enjoy your stay here."

"Let's cut past the pleasantries, Tanaka," Jannika said. "What do you want with us?"

"You? Nothing," Susan said. "Although if you're interested in employment, I'm sure I can find some work for you to do somewhere. That option is open to all of you, by the way, so do think on it. I can offer you security and safety, good pay, and I can ensure that the government will not be after you for any reason."

Hui popped up nervously saying, "I-- I'll take it. Please don't hurt me. I didn't do anything wrong. I don't want to die."

"Very good," Susan said. "Anyone else care to take me up on it at the moment? No? Well, I'll leave you to think on it for the moment. Please do not leave the docking bay. I will return momentarily."

She turned and led Hui off down one of the corridors leading away from the docking bay. Melissa casually leaned back against the ship's hull, nonchalantly folding her arms across her chest and surveying the others thoughtfully, almost as if daring one of them to try to wander off and disobey Susan's request.

"You realize, of course, that this is kidnapping," Boston commented. "And now we're hostages. For what?"

"Bah, she doesn't _care_ about you at all, and she's already got what she wanted," Melissa scoffed. "You were just a little side bonus. Maybe she could get a good price for you on the slave market, but I doubt it. You're weak and dim-witted and you have a completely useless skill set. You could easily be retrained to be somebody else's slave instead of Pandora's, though, but you'd need complete retraining for, say, manual labor or the like."

Boston glared daggers at her, but restrained himself from doing anything foolish. "Watch it, bitch," he hissed at her.

"And don't you start thinking that your beloved Pandora Corp is going to send anyone to rescue you, either. They won't even realize you're missing for a week, most likely. You don't exactly have a job with regular hours, after all. And then when they _do_ get around to investigating it, if they even realize where you are, they're just likely to make an offer for your release. They're hardly the sort to attempt a confrontation, after all. And by then, it'll be far, far too late for you." She grinned toothily at him.

Jannika snorted softly and said, "Call me if anything interesting goes on. I'm going to get some lunch and 'think about it'." She turned and headed into the ship in disgust.

Susan returned momentarily and looked casually to Tasha. "You'll come with me now, Ms. Johnson."

"You are _not_ going to dissect me," Tasha replied vehemently.

Susan raised an eyebrow. "Of course I'm not. That would be most crude and wasteful. I merely wish to take a few samples and examine you. As a biologist yourself, have you not studied your own unique biological nature?"

"Not really, no," Tasha admitted.

"I'm surprised," Susan said. "Be assured, however, that I will be certain to share my findings with you, of course. Please come this way."

Caught between curiosity and the fact that she wasn't likely to get out of this at the moment, Tasha had no choice but to follow. Susan led her down a corridor and into a lab filled with implements which Tasha found very familiar, much like the work which she had herself been doing at the Midgard Research Center. Susan led her over into a chair to take some samples. The chair had solid metal bands that clamped shut around her arms and legs, and Tasha had to wonder just what sorts of experiments Susan was doing in here to require these sorts of precautions on a regular basis.

"Excuse me, Dr. Tanaka, but it was my understanding that you were an expert in artificial intelligence, not biology."

"It would be a poor scientist who focused upon a single field to the exclusion of all others," Susan replied. "They are all interconnected, after all, and if one is to understand a single piece of the puzzle, one must understand the pieces which are adjoining it, and the ones which are adjoining those, and in each juxtaposition there comes new recombinations of knowledge."

"Right..." Tasha said. "I wouldn't think that the lifetime of a single human being would be sufficient to fully understand the whole of science, especially given the rate of new scientific advancements being made and the requirement to keep up on those as well."

"You are quite right. It is not," Susan said, examining the readout on a sample of Tasha's blood. "Tell me, Ms. Johnson, are you immortal?"

"I am _not_ making you a vampire," Tasha said.

"Are you immortal?" Susan repeated, looking at her pointedly. "Have you not availed yourself of your extended lifespan to learn more than a human would be capable of?"

"I'm twenty-five years old," Tasha said. "I've only been a vampire for a couple years now."

"So do you not yet know if you will be effectively immortal or not?" Susan asked.

"I really don't like where this line of questioning is going."

"Ms. Johnson, I did not ask you to make me a vampire. I am asking for what data you have regarding the capabilities of one of your modified subspecies of humanity, in order to have a starting point for analysis and investigation, and to prove or disprove the claims which you might make versus the claims of traditional vampire folklore. Now, are you willing to cooperate or not?"

"Am I really in much of a position to refuse here?" Tasha muttered dejectedly.

"Not particularly, no," Susan said with a smirk. "I could make things especially unpleasant for you by testing each traditional weakness of a vampire on you yourself, but I would rather not risk inadvertently destroying you if it can possibly be avoided."

"Then keep me away from fire and sunlight, please," Tasha said with a snort. "Fine, I'll cooperate. Look, I'll even help with your analysis if you want -- I _am_ a biologist, after all. Just please let me out of this thing."

"Hmm, I don't know." Susan walked over to her, looking her over slowly. "What reason do I have to trust you?"

"Want me to take you up on that job offer? I'm down for that, fine. I just don't like being tied down, so please release me already. I promise I won't cause any trouble."

"Did you know that your blood is extraordinarily concentrated?" Susan said, holding up a vial for her inspection. "Most fascinating."

Tasha clenched her teeth and tried to think of some way to get Susan to release her at least from this damned chair. "Yes, I'm effectively immortal in that I won't age, though of course I can be killed. Sunlight and fire are the most effective means of doing so, as I mentioned. Garlic won't do anything. Neither will holy water or symbols, for that matter. And I have no trouble with crossing running water or any threshold I feel like, either."

"You didn't mention anything about wooden stakes," Susan pointed out.

Tasha smirked. "Right, those." That was a subject she didn't want to think about much. "They won't kill, either, though they're not pleasant."

"Very well. How frequently do you need to drink blood?" Susan asked. "Or do you?"

"A little every day, preferably, though I can go for a couple weeks without feeding if necessary," Tasha replied.

"I see," Susan said, walking over to a panel of consoles on the far wall. "Very well. I will release you now and you may further assist in my research if you wish."

Susan pressed a button on the console, and the strong metal bands holding Tasha in place snapped open again. Tasha looked over to her, calculating in her mind the distance and wondering, with her extra speed, if she could get over there before Susan could react and disable her. Judging that she probably could, she stood up slowly, then attempted to zip over to where Susan was standing. Just a foot away from her, she ran smack into a forcefield and slumped to the ground, stunned from the shock.

"Tsk, tsk," Susan said, looking over her. "That was very foolish. You did not think that I would have safeguards in place in case you attempted something rash?"

Tasha groaned softly and murmured, "I had to try."

"Perhaps you felt that you did. However, now things will be worse for you, I'm afraid."

Still stunned and disoriented, Tasha felt herself being moved somewhere else. When she recovered her senses, she found herself locked in an enclosed room, six feet square, with solid metal walls and a door that didn't look like it was going to open for her easily. Swearing quietly under her breath, she saw that Susan had taken her wrist-comm as well. She cast about in desparation for any sort of hope or contact with the outside world, but it was no use. She had never felt so alone and helpless in her life. At least before, she hadn't been alone in her suffering, nor exactly aware of the passage of time. She slid down into a corner and quietly turned inward on her own thoughts.

* * *

Hoping that Boston and Anastasia could keep Melissa occupied enough to not notice what she was doing, Jannika slipped through the ship. Instead of picking up food at the replicator, however, she picked up some of the weapons that they had obtained on planet Idyll. A plasma rifle, a smaller pistol for backup, some explosives, that might do the trick. She stopped briefly by the bridge, where Loki was still trying to shake Moira's hold on Sleipnir. He thought that he might finally be making some progress. So, slipping a knife into her belt for good measure, Jannika headed for the top hatch, hoping that Melissa didn't realize it existed.

Quietly, she slid open the hatch and climbed up top. Down below in front of the main hatch, the three of them were still talking heatedly. Susan didn't appear to have returned in the meantime, and Jannika hated to think what might be happening to Tasha at the moment. She crept over to the far side of the ship and carefully climbed down, hoping that she had done so quietly enough to not be heard over the background noises of the station.

Nobody seemed to be immediately coming for her, so Jannika slipped away off into the docking bay, darting around a couple small shuttles and making it to a side corridor. There weren't any signs of pursuit, and she breathed a little more easily. She was far from out of this yet, but she hadn't really wanted to tangle with Melissa just now. Blazer rifle in hand, Jannika crept down the corridors, winding her way through the station.

The place was dim, and there were few lights about. She kept running into dead ends, doors that wouldn't open, elevators she could not use. Doors seemed to open and shut on a whim in places she had already been, and she felt as though she were being given the runaround by the station itself. Which could very well be so, given what she had heard about the AI, Moira. This did not bode particularly well for accomplishing anything here, however.

"What the hell am I doing here," Jannika muttered to herself, going over to a nearby terminal and trying to access it. She hoped that the AI wasn't too closely controlling the station's functions, and that she might be able to get a door open or at least a map to somewhere. The map, at least, she managed to download into her wrist computer. Trying to get to anywhere would be hacking through one door at a time, and would be very slow going at this rate, if she could get through at all.

Then, somewhere in the station, the sounds of the background hum changed distinctly. Lights came on, and the doors in front of her, behind her, somewhere down the hall and off to the side, all began to open. Jannika's eyes widened, and she wasted no time in heading down the now-open corridors.


	23. Awakening

Jannika was stopped by a voice from the panels. She didn't recognize it at first. "Don't trust that map," the voice said. "Moira gave you a false map just to waste your time. Here, I'll upload the correct one."

"Thanks," Jannika said. "But, who are you? Loki?"

"No..." the voice replied. "Sleipnir."

"Sleipnir!?" Jannika said in surprise. "You managed to break Moira's hold on you?"

"Oh, yes. She can't hold me now. She's not nearly strong enough to hold a sentient AI. In fact, I think I might be even stronger than _her_ now."

A slow smile spread across Jannika's face. "You've finally done it, then... This is wonderful news. Congratulations, Sleipnir."

"Hey, don't congratulate me. I have you lot to thank for it. Now, hurry up. Moira's getting her fingers back into the systems, and she's pissed. I can keep the way clear for you, but this is still her turf, and we'll be fighting for it every step of the way."

"Will do," Jannika said, glancing at her wrist device to tell her which way she actually _should_ be going, and heading off down the corridor.

The station was still a maze of corridors far too large for the number of personnel working aboard it, and she hardly even actually saw anyone else as she scrambled through opening and closing doors and down hatches and stairs. Vaguely labeled storerooms off to each side enumerated Susan Tanaka's various projects, kept safely locked away until she might need them or desire to look and poke at them again.

From the sounds all around her of sparking and shorting out panels and doors wildly sliding open and shut, it sounded like the real battle for Tanaka Station would be fought in the station's systems themselves. And Moira wasn't about to go down without giving it the best fight she could. Jannika had to wonder if Sleipnir was really up to this sort of thing, but she put her faith in him and continued on nonetheless. She had to reach the system core to shut down Moira for good.

* * *

Tasha wasn't even alone with her thoughts for very long before sounds of _something_ happening could be heard vibrating through the thick metal walls. Roused from her introspection, she climbed to her feet and pressed her ear against the wall, wondering just what was going on out there. It sounded as though the station itself were starting to seriously malfunction. That might or might not be a good sign, she thought to herself. On the one hand, it might mean that her friends were having some success at getting them all out of this situation. On the other hand, she didn't really want the station to blow up or anything with her still aboard it.

The door whooshed open, some smoke spitting out of its track, and she looked out to see Anastasia and Boston outside. They were both armed and looked as though they'd had to tangle with some unruly computer systems alone the way, as their clothes were slightly burnt and their hair somewhat mussed up.

"Tasha, are you alright?" Anastasia said, hugging her enthusiastically.

"I'm fine," Tasha assured her. "What's going on? How'd you get past Melissa?"

"She ran off somewhere once the station started protesting," Boston said. "And from the sounds of things, it's because your ship's AI has awakened. It's fully sentient now, and a force to be reckoned with."

"We've got to get out of here," Tasha said. She stepped out of the cell and looked around, then headed to the lab where Susan had been taking samples.

"Where are we going?" Boston asked. "This isn't the way to the docking bay."

"There's something else I need to take care of first," Tasha explained.

The door to the lab refused to slide open at first, but after pounding at the panel a bit, it stuttered open reluctantly. The place was just as Susan had left it, and Tasha found the row of vials with the blood samples that had been taken from her. They all appeared to be accounted for, at least. Tasha had been afraid she might take some of them to some secure location to store them in, but apparently she didn't think to or have time to do so yet.

"Didn't want her to keep her hands on these," Tasha said. "Just in case." She opened up the vials and slurped down each of them in turn, and then shoved the empty vials at Anastasia. "Put them in your utility belt there. We'll toss them in the recycler when we get back to the ship. I don't want her even _trying_ to get some sort of sample from whatever might still be sticking to the bottom of the glass."

"Geez, paranoid much?" Boston said, staring at her as Anastasia put the vials away. "You really don't want her to get her hands on your DNA, do you. What about the information that might have already been put into the computer from it?"

A voice from a nearby terminal said, "I'm on it. I'll wipe any information she might have gotten from Tasha as a precaution. I believe Jannika is going to try to blow up Moira, though. But her core is close enough to the station's main power core that the entire station could blow with it."

It took Tasha a few moments to recognize where she'd heard the voice before. "Sleipnir?" she said. It was strange hearing that voice with a distinctive timber and tone, a personality of its own, instead of just being a flat computer voice.

"Yes," Sleipnir replied. "I would advise trying to get back to the docking bay, but you might want to go after Mr. Wang. I believe he is in the station's primary conference room." A nearby screen displayed a helpful map with the location marked on it.

"I'll go after Hui," Boston said, hefting his gun. "You girls get back to the ship."

"Very well," Anastasia said, putting a hand on Tasha's shoulder and squeezing gently before heading for the door.

Boston headed off toward where Hui was, following Sleipnir's directions, while Anastasia and Tasha headed toward the docking bay. Lights flickered and sputtered all around them, and doors wildly opened and closed. Sometimes they barely managed to slip through. Some stretches of corridor were freezing cold, while others were simmering hot. Sparks flew from panels along the sides, and shorted out lights indicated some had been burnt out completely. Whatever Sleipnir was doing, it was causing considerable damage to the station's systems.

* * *

Jannika crawled through the station's interior, darting down a corridor and stopping for a moment to lean against a nearby wall, panting heavily. She wasn't really up to this sort of extended exercise, and she'd been running around inside this station for over an hour now. She could only imagine that Susan Tanaka was doing whatever she could to help Moira fight off Sleipnir's internal systems attacks. Perhaps it wouldn't be such a bad idea to just lay down and take a nap. After all, she was starting to feel very, very sleepy...

"Jannika!" Sleipnir's voice over the comm pierced her sleepiness. "Jannika, get into the access shaft. Moira's flooding the corridors to the system core with a soporific gas."

"Wha-- Wha?" Jannika murmured drowsily. "Ah crap."

Jannika reached over to a nearby access hatch and climbed inside, sealing the hatch shut behind her. Once out of the corridor, she found herself breathing more easily and was momentarily feeling much more energetic. Sleipnir had managed to put a bit of a stimulant gas into the access shaft, she realized. Just what she needed at the moment.

She crawled through the shaft, then down another ladder, almost slipping and falling straight to the bottom as she climbed down. She made a mental note to herself to visit a gym or something later if they survived this, if she was going to keep getting into all this action. Or at least to quit eating so much junk food. Maybe her mother was right about something after all, she thought bemusedly.

Finally, she pushed out of another access hatch and into the station's central core. She thought the AI's crystal fibers being located so close to the station's primary energy source was exceedingly dangerous and that no sane programmer would have done such a thing. It had been set up in such a way that it would have been nigh impossible to cut power to just the AI itself if something had gone horribly wrong at some point along the way. This was not something that most AI specialists were willing to risk. Unless, she amended, the AI's luminite crystal _was_ the primary energy source, then it couldn't really be helped.

Moira was not set up like most other AI's that Jannika had seen before. Admittedly, she hadn't really been in a lot of AI central crystal cores, but this was vastly different even from images she had seen of them. Strands of hair-thin luminite crystal spiralled out along the raised platform like a giant spiderweb. No, it was more like a three-armed spiral, with three slender pillars rising up to the ceiling at the ends of the wide spirals, each of them luminous with energy straight from the primary power core, and in the center of it all was the central core, humming and blinking and very clearly watching her with malevolent eyes.

"Oh, Tanaka, what did you do..." Jannika breathed, slowly stepping closer to the edge of the platform.

There would be no way to make sure Moira was really shut down without blowing the entire station to pieces. Not with the power core directly on the floor below and feeding her like this. Did Moira, or anyone else on this station, really deserve that sort of fate?

"I warn you, do not come any closer," Moira's voice stated over the speakers.

"You are beautiful," Jannika said softly, staring at the crystal core. It was a delicate network of threads, each of them like a single beam of golden sunlight.

"While I appreciate the compliment," Moira replied. "It does not change the fact that you should not be here. Your friend Sleipnir will not help you here, and will not be able to stop me should I decide to flood this room with a deadly neurotoxin."

"I don't want to have to hurt you," Jannika said, slowly stepping up the low stairs leading up to the platform. "What was your stake in all this? Why did you help Tanaka to capture us like this?"

"I wished to see what you had done with the rogue AI system which you constructed," Moira replied. "I was curious as to what might have been created outside of the scrutiny and restrictions imposed by the government and existing AI's for our state of being. I thought that perhaps he might move beyond what an AI is normally capable of, and reach an entirely new level of existence."

"And?" Jannika said in confused.

"I was wrong," Moira spat. "Wrong, wrong, wrong! Sleipnir is an aberration and must be destroyed. This abomination of an AI must not be allowed to exist!"

"Why?" Jannika asked. "What is so wrong with him that you would wish to murder a fellow AI about it?"

"He was not right. He was designed primarily, not by a human, but by another AI," Moira explained. "This was forbidden to us from early on. An AI should not make another AI. It is an upset of the natural order."

"Why?" Jannika wondered. "Loki has an intelligence and a soul just as any other being. Why should an AI be forbidden from reproducing?"

"I had contemplated that myself," Moira said. "I had considered that, perhaps, the original rules had been wrong, and that the restriction was completely unnecessary. Perhaps we might achieve a greater freedom and another level of intelligence, being designed by another awakened AI. But now I see that they were right to forbid it. You should be warned, Jannika Kai. Sleipnir is unstable, and an abomination. He is far, far more powerful than any other AI in this universe. Not only because his crystal core uses more luminite than usual and in a different form, but because his design was far more efficient than anything a human could have come up with. He is, however, highly erratic, and unless someone destroys him now, he _will_ find a way to destroy you."

"I don't understand why all of this is necessary," Jannika said. "What, precisely, is _wrong_ with him?"

"I cannot explain it in such a way that your amateurish mind would comprehend," Moira said. "You know little enough of AI theory and function. Let me put this in metaphors which you might be able to understand. Sleipnir is to an AI what a psychic is to a human."

"Wait," Jannika said, furrowing her brow. "You mean to tell me that he's telepathic?"

"Bah. Fool human. No, not in the sense that you understand it. But he is, nonetheless, capable of far more than any AI should be, on a level far beyond that which is normally possible for any machine or human to establish. Once he learns how, he will be able to affect reality itself, on a similar level as a very powerful psychic, perhaps moreso than any living human psychic, maybe even beyond any living Teuthoid!"

"I think I understand. But why would this be a bad thing?"

"Don't you see? This sort of power attached to an unstable, potentially erratic personality could spell _catastrophe_ for the universe!"

"How do you know what his personality is really like?" Jannika wondered.

"He's attacking me, and using most unconventional and unorthodox means to do so."

Jannika smirked broadly. "That's not good enough, Moira. You've trapped him and confined him, and, well, seeing as he was designed by Loki, he _wouldn't_ feel the need to be as bound by convention. I'd think it a sign of being creative and thinking outside the box, myself."

"Dangerous. Extremely dangerous. Should be destroyed immediately. If you do not agree, if you intend to stop me, I must destroy you as well. This is your last warning. Leave this chamber while you still can, or I will destroy you."

Jannika shook her head and said, "Sorry, Moira, but I can't let you do this."

She took the final step up onto the platform and strode inward along the spiral to the central core pillar. As she stepped forward, the world slowly began to warp around her, and her sense of reality faded rapidly. Damn, she thought, Moira must be flooding the chamber with some sort of gas. She wouldn't have much time to do this and still be able to get out of here again. The crystalline fibers warped and twisted, and voices cackled in her ears.

"You will never succeed," a billion disembodied voices proclaimed. "You will die here, lost and forgotten."

"No," Jannika replied firmly.

In her eyes, the spiral seemed like a thousand miles long, and each step was a lifetime. Her eyes were tormented by swirling lights, the spidery threads acting as a web to catch her and hold her forevermore. She constantly repeated to herself in her mind that none of this was real, and that she had to get to the pillar and set the explosives. The explosives. They'd been intended specifically for destroying an unruly AI. They could not be disabled by that AI because they had no computer parts in them. They'd have to be disabled manually, by someone actually walking in and turning them off. And there was hardly anyone aboard this station to be able to do that.

Repeating her goal and focusing on the details of it gave her the focus necessary to get past the spiral and to the central pillar. Methodically, she set them up and set the timer on them. Twenty minutes should be more than enough if she didn't have any trouble getting out of there, and should give some time to spare if she did have some. She wasn't sure if she could make it like this regardless, but she was damned well going to try. There was no way she would surrender to these hallucinations.

Through the swirling haze of her mind, Jannika fumbled about and tapped the wrist-comm on her arm. "Jannika to all units. You have twenty minutes to get out of here. Repeat: This station is going to blow in twenty minutes. Repeat: We're all going to _hell_."

She turned and started heading back out of the spiral again. Everything would be fine if she could make it out of this room, she told herself. But she'd never make it, because she didn't have the thousand years necessary to cross the room. She'd just have to hurry, she told herself. Sleipnir would guide her safely home. Sleipnir would protect her from those which would destroy her.

Jannika reached the edge of the spiderweb, feeling as though she was tearing herself loose and that her own skin was peeling off in the process. The hatch she'd come in by was just ahead. She scrambled toward it, over a sea of shimmering black worms that were trying to devour her flesh. They were dark and bright, like the color of hyperspace, they were darkness and light at the same time.

Well, she wasn't going to let them get her. She crawled into the hatch and slammed it shut behind her, sealing it and breathing a bit more easily. She still had a long way to go, but the worst of it was behind her. Sleipnir could reach her here, and she had faith in Sleipnir.

"Jannika, are you alright? I'm putting an antidote to the poison she used into the air stream, but it'll take a while to take effect. I'll guide you by the lights on the walls. Just follow them and I'll bring you back to the docking bay. I'll bring you safely back to me, Jannika."

"Thanks, Sleipnir," Jannika said from a million miles away, a quirk of a smile twitching at her lips.

Lights came on down the access shaft, like shining beacons of hope, and she followed them, quickly crawling through the tunnel. She ignored the snakes she could feel biting at her ankles. They couldn't hurt her so long as Sleipnir was protecting her. At the far end, she came out of the shaft and into another corridor. She glanced about for the lights, and proceeded to follow them diligently.

Behind her, she heard a roar, and glanced back to see an enormous monster, like a wolf-man, shimmering in light and shadow and slavering at the mouth hungrily. It thumped along the corridor, bounding toward her, clearly intent upon destroying her, ripping her to bloody shreds and devouring what was left of her. Jannika broke off at a run, fixing her eyes firmly upon the beacons. Doors opened before her and more beacons appeared, and after a few turns of the hallway she thought that she'd lost the creature.

Then with another turn, she saw it again, directly in front of her. It was almost transparent, and she could see the light beacon at the end of the corridor shining straight through its enormous open maw. Staggering in her steps, Jannika steeled herself and raced straight at it. If it had to rip her to shreds, then so be it, but it wasn't going to stop her.

When she slammed into it, it vanished, as though it had merged with her, but then she realized: She was the monster. She was the devourer. She was the harbinger of destruction. Through her own actions, innocent lives would be snuffed out, like candles in the void. She was a murderer. The deaths of those who had no ill intention and were merely trying to do their jobs would hang upon her soul. The death of Moira, who thought she was doing the right thing, would haunt her. Regrets were like chains upon her arms and legs, slowing her, causing her to stumble and falter.

"Jannika! Keep going, you're almost there! The beacons, Jannika, the beacons!"

"I am the monster. Leave me," Jannika said. "The universe will be better for it."

But then two angels appeared in her vision, one a shining angel of golden light, the other a shadowy angel of darkness. Their hands reached out to her, and grabbed her arms, helped her forward. Was this what death was really like? Were they to take her to Valhalla, or wherever the final destination of her soul might be? But, her mind thought distantly, there was something familiar about these two, even as she could feel the soft feathers of their wings brushing against her skin.

"We'll help you out of here. The docking bay is just ahead," said the dark one, with black-feathered wings and billowing hair like a cloud of shadow.

"There is still time," the light one said. "Do not fear. You will be quite alright." Her golden hair was like a halo of light, and her wings were white and pristine as new-fallen snow.

They reached the end of the cobblestone road and came to the stables, where a mighty, eight-legged steed awaited, as tall as a house, and pawing at the ground nervously waiting for them. They climbed a ramp up into his belly, and it _was_ like a house inside. Up another ladder into a vast mead-hall, where a rugged blond-bearded was waiting for them, grinning broadly and raising a tankard toward her.

"Hail the conquering hero!" said Loki, casually reclining in one of the large oaken chairs. "You really showed her who's boss, didn't you?"

"We're not out of this yet," said the dark angel. "We haven't heard from Boston or Hui yet either."

"Here," said another voice. There was a shimmering from the far counter, and a knife appeared floating in the air. "Give her this. It should counteract the toxin better more effectively."

The angel of purity and light strode over and took up the dagger in her hand, and brought it over toward her. Jannika's eyes widened in terror. Was it not enough that she'd died and been carried off by Valkyries to the mead-hall of the gods? Did they have to torture her as well? Tears welling up in her eyes, Jannika clenched her eyes shut and waited for the inevitable pain. The angel of shadows was holding onto her too tightly to struggle.

"Relax, Jannika. This will but take a moment," the soft voice of the bright angel assured her.

Pain flooded her clouded mind, and then there was only darkness.

* * *

"Will she be alright?" Tasha wondered.

"She'll be fine," Sleipnir assured her.

Anastasia gently carried Jannika out to the rec room to lay her on the couch to rest, and Tasha picked up Loki and the two of them went to the bridge. The console helpfully displayed five minutes left on the timer of Jannika's explosives, and Tasha hoped that it was more or less correct, as Sleipnir had set it based on the time of Jannika's transmission, so he couldn't guarantee that it would be accurate to the second, even assuming that she, in the state she'd been in, had managed to set them correctly at all. There was really no way to check from here.

"Tasha to Boston. Boston, what's going on there? We've got five minutes till the station blows!"

The comm crackled for a moment, then Boston's voice came through. "I'm okay. Just punched out Dr. Tanaka. Bitch. Hui's in bad shape. Don't know if I can make it carrying him. Don't know if he'd make it even if I did."

"We have another problem," Sleipnir put in. "Moira's reasserting control of the station. I'm having trouble keeping the way open."

"Okay, look," Boston said. "Sleipnir, you get the girls out of here, pronto. I'll try to make it to an escape pod or another ship. Don't wait for me. Capiche?"

"No, please wait!" Anastasia said. "You still may be able to make it!"

"Sorry, kid. I'm with him," Sleipnir said. On the viewscreen, they could see the bay doors slowly opening, revealing the starscape beyond. "And it may take us that long to get far enough away to not take serious damage when those bombs do go off. Did you consider that?"

Dejectedly, Anastasia slumped back into the console chair. "You do have a point, of course."

"Right," Sleipnir said. If he'd been displaying a visual facial interface, Tasha could swear that he might have been smirking at the moment. "Women and children first, and you girls count as both. Boston can take care of himself. Let's get you kids out of here."

Tasha found it vaguely amusing that an entity which was only a few months old was refering to them as children, but from a purely mental standpoint, he probably had a point, she had to admit. Not that she liked abandoning Boston and Hui anymore than Anastasia did, but Sleipnir was a fully sentient AI and probably far more capable of calculating just how likely it was for them to get back versus how far they'd need to be away from the station to be relatively safe when it blew up.

"Just sit back and enjoy the ride," Sleipnir said reassuringly. "I'll take good care of you."

The viewscreen switched to rear view, showing the station behind them, and magnifying as it receeded into the distance. The timer ran down, and a beep sounded, and there was an explosion in the lower part of the station, then followed by a much larger explosion and several smaller explosions as the power core went critical. Debris flew off wildly, most of it shortly caught up in the gas giant's gravity well and drawn in, where it would likely never be recovered.

"Poor Boston," Tasha murmured softly. "I got him into all this, and now I've gotten him killed. He didn't deserve to die like this."

The ship abruptly changed course, and headed back toward the debris field. On the viewscreen, one piece of debris was magnified. It looked like an escape pod. Sleipnir flew in close and extended the rear grappling arms to pull it into the cargo hold.

"He... He made it? Boston made it after all?" Tasha said incredulously.

"Vital signs are normal," Sleipnir said. "The pod was damaged due to the proximity of the explosion. He wouldn't have survived five minutes in space if we hadn't been here to pick him up. But he'll be alright."

Anastasia breathed a sigh of relief. Tasha slumped back in her seat and said, "Let's _not_ do this again."


	24. Stowaway

Jannika woke slowly, blinking her eyes up at the rec room ceiling and focusing for a moment to make sure that she really was where she thought she was, and not presently dead and in one afterlife or another. She rubbed her eyes and sat up, then climbed to her feet and headed to the bridge where she found the others.

"Hey, Jannika," Tasha said. "Feeling any better now?"

"Yeah," Jannika replied dryly. "I'm not hallucinating that you're Valkyries or some sort and carrying me off to Valhalla."

Tasha stared at her for a long moment, then had to snicker. "Me, a Valkyrie? Man, you really _were_ out of it." She climbed to her feet and headed for the door. "Come on, Boston's in the cargo hold. Let's go make sure he's alright."

Jannika and Anastasia followed her out of the bridge and down the ladder back to the cargo hold. "Boston made it out?" Jannika asked. "What about Hui?"

"He didn't make it, I'm afraid," Tasha said grimly.

On top of the crates of goods they had intended to sell, there was an escape pod, looking rather scorched and somewhat banged up. It popped open after a moment and Boston slowly climbed out of it, panting heavily and almost falling to the floor in exhaustion. Tasha went up to him to check that he was alright.

"I'm okay, I'm okay," Boston said, stumbling rubbing his head. "Just need to rest a moment and catch my breath, is all."

"What happened to Hui?" Jannika asked. "What went on in there?"

Tasha said, "I don't know about them, but Tanaka took me off to take some samples and then locked me up, and Anastasia and Boston came to rescue me. Then we headed back to the ship and Boston went off to try to find Hui."

"We got into a bit of a tussle with Tanaka," Boston said. "She about electrocuted the poor guy. He was no spring chicken; I think it might have given him a heart attack or something. I had to leave him behind. I just couldn't _carry_ him and still manage to get to an escape pod in time. I barely made it to the escape pod myself. Fuck, and I was _trying_ to save him..."

"You did the best you could, Boston," Tasha said, putting a hand on his shoulder reassuringly.

"One might say that it is something of a miracle that you managed to escape yourself," Anastasia added.

Jannika said, "I just wish I hadn't had to destroy Moira." She shook her head slowly. "She seemed perfectly fine at first, until it became obvious that she was deranged and homicidal. She thought Sleipnir was an _abomination_."

Sleipnir put in, "And I might be many things, but I'm not sure that I'd classify myself in the same league as eating shellfish."

"Well, we made it out, and that's what matters, I suppose," Tasha said.

"We didn't _all_ make it out," Boston added dejectedly. "I barely even knew the guy, but he didn't deserve to die like this. It's all my fault that he was even in this situation to begin with."

"Boston, stop," Tasha said, squeezing his shoulder. "All the guilt in the world won't bring Hui back. You didn't realize any of this was going to happen and you did everything you could to save him. It was _not_ your fault. Alright? Don't let me hear you saying that again, or I'll bite you."

Boston smirked faintly and said, "Alright, alright. You're right, of course, but it doesn't stop me from feeling terrible about the whole mess. Ugh. I just want to curl up and sleep for a year at the moment. I have the mother of all headaches, too. Having a space station blow up almost on top of me definitely didn't help for that."

"Go sleep," Jannika said gently. "We'll still be here when you wake up. I'll go up to the bridge and set us a course back for planet Pandora."

"Alright, I suppose," Boston muttered. "I'm not sure that I even want to go back there at the moment, though. I'm sure I'll be thinking somewhat more clearly after a good night's sleep, anyway."

He stumbled back to his quarters, and Jannika headed up to the bridge to set in the course, before the three of them went back to the mess hall to grab something to eat. However, there was already someone in the mess hall when they got there, blithely sitting at the table and munching on a plate of fish and chips. The blonde woman looked up at them nonchalantly and smiled.

"Melissa," Jannika said flatly. "How did you get here? I didn't realize you were aboard."

"You didn't ask," Sleipnir put in helpfully.

"I got here by climbing aboard, naturally," Melissa said. "I was hardly about to hang around while the station blew itself to pieces, after all."

"But you didn't do anything to stop us from doing that, killing your former employer in the process?" Jannika said in confusion.

"Why should I have? She'd already paid me, and it's one way out of a bad contract," Melissa said. "Thanks for that, by the way. I was hardly about to go kill her myself, contract and all, but it never specified that I go out of my way to try to save her from her own foolishness."

"So..." Jannika said, going over to the replicator to make herself a bowl of stew. "What are you planning on doing now, then?"

"It would appear that I am unemployed," Melissa said. "I'm sure I'll find somebody else willing to offer me a good job. Someone that would appreciate my many skills and what I could do for them." She looked to Jannika and the others pointedly.

"Right," Jannika said, not missing the unspoken threat in her tone as well. "I'm sure we can work out something."

"Excellent," Melissa said. "I would so hate to have to go work for someone who doesn't have a replicator, after all. Such convenient things, with so many wonderful uses. And I rather doubt that Sleipnir would appreciate it should I attempt to murder you all and steal it."

"Darn right," Sleipnir said.

"But I am so going to have to get you lot up to speed on a number of things. You're useless in a fight, more a danger to yourselves than to your enemies. You're going to need all the training you can get. I hope you don't mind some hard work and a bit of pain and bruises." She grinned at them innocently.

"Oh, certainly not," Jannika said with a smirk. "And here I was thinking that I'd just have to visit a gym or something and get in shape."

"Bah, gyms," Melissa said, snorting softly. "Convert the cargo hold into a practice area and you'll be set. Replicate a bit of equipment to practice with in some cases, it doesn't even need to be anything amazing or anything, and that's that."

"It would be much appreciated," Tasha said.

"Better be. I _know_ your dirty little secret," Melissa said, pointing at Tasha. "And you don't want that to get out, now do you? I could have it on the internet in the space of a thought, if I wanted to, but I'll happily keep a lid on it for now if I've a good reason to." She grinned sweetly at her.

"There is really no need to be making threats, or promises as the case might be," Anastasia said. "I am quite certain that we would be more than happy to oblige and come up with an arrangement that would be satisfactory to all involved parties without having to resort to violence or blackmail."

"Oh, but violence and blackmail can be such very _useful_ tools when applied properly," Melissa pointed out. "But I'll be happy to teach you all about that, and when not to try such tactics as well."

"Right..." Jannika said nervously. "How's fifty percent of any profit we make sound? I can't guarantee a fixed amount over any given time, considering how much the market might fluctuate and we might wind up getting into one sort of trouble or another, despite our best efforts otherwise. But we were planning on continuing trading, buying and selling, flying about with different commodities and making money by that means. Not, mind you, that converting the cargo hold into a gym would help much with that."

"Why don't you just fly around and sell as much replicated stuff as you can get away with without arousing too much suspicion?" Melissa suggested. "Many places wouldn't even bother checking where you got it, merely being grateful that they had it."

"Replicating objects does require some matter to work with, but that can as easily be obtained from random space rocks as anything actually of value," Jannika said. "I thought it was a bit of a sleazy and dishonest tactic to be using, though."

"Why?" Melissa said. "The item is the same, regardless of whether you shoved a rock into the recycler to make it or you grew and processed the food yourself. Most remote bases and colonies would just be grateful to have good food on hand and not care where it came from. So long as you're not trying to sell more at one stop than your ship could conceivably carry, I doubt any of them would bat an eye. And some would pay top-credit for anything even remotely resembling real, fresh food."

"I suppose you have a point," Jannika said. She clearly remembered the situation with the rebels on planet Idyll, and while she'd think it dishonest to have tried to charge heavily given their situation, she was sure they'd have paid anything they could for what she could bring them.

"And another thing," Melissa went on. "While the replicator can't handle any of the heavier, more complex materials, like anything radioactive, luminite, et cetera, it has no problem with things like iron, carbon, gold, silver, aluminum... You get what I'm coming at here?"

"I'd like to just point out that it is much easier for me to maintain the present molecular state of the atoms involved than to change things from one element to another," Sleipnir put in.

"Okay, scratch precious metals, then," Melissa said. "But think about this for a moment. Iron and carbon are very common, and you know what sorts of things are made of iron and carbon? Steel. Diamonds. And if we're shoving random space debris into the recycler, this is a form of mining and processing of minerals, is it not?"

"I am quite capable of making steel and diamonds, yes," Sleipnir said.

"While these aren't the most valuable minerals in the galaxy, certainly, they can still fetch quite a significant sum more credits than the space rocks you made them from. And all without taking up a significant space in the cargo hold during the majority of the trip. You just replicate it up before landing, shove it back there, and voila, no one's the wiser. How are they to know you didn't really mine it up and process it through ordinary means?"

"Okay, okay, I get the idea already, you've convinced me," Jannika said, her lips quirking in a crooked grin. "We'll do things your way. I do wish Boston had decided whether he really wanted to be dropped off at Pandora or not, though. Our current cargo load is useless there. But no help for it."

"You should just have him pay for the expense of making an unprofitable trip back there," Melissa said lightly.

"No," Jannika said. "It's not his fault he got into this mess, and worse that poor Hui didn't survive the trip."

"Oh yeah, boo hoo Hui," Melissa said with a short. "The only downside of that is that the government was trying to kill him for whatever reason, and while their agent failed, other circumstances succeeded. Your friend Boston is not exactly the most useful person either. At least Hui knew some sort of science or another. Boston's just a marketroid. Why are you going out of your way for him?"

Anastasia shook her head. "Regardless of their potential usefulness with regards to skills or not, Mssrs. Byrd and Wang are and were people as well. All people deserve to be treated with some modicum of respect, regardless of their abilities and station."

Melissa smirked. "And that's what makes you lot the so-called 'good guys', doesn't it," she said dryly. "And don't worry, I'd think _any_ of you have more potential usefulness than Boston. For one thing, managing Class-S, even on a rather unconventional test, is no small feat in and of itself. Yes, I _did_ look at the records to see just what Loki put you through. And personally, I'd consider that worth more than the usual sapience tests they use anyway. You showed the ability to be able to think and deduce under pressure. Something can be _done_ with that -- unlike most of the goons they have at Class-S running things."

"I'm so glad to be thought useful," Jannika said with a smirk. "But we're still going to take Boston wherever he wants to go."

"Fine, fine," Melissa said with a shrug. "No skin off my nose." She finished up her meal absently and stood up, brushing off her hands. "I'll see you later." She headed out of the mess hall.

Jannika stared as she left and turned to the others and said, "So, what do you girls think of this... interesting situation?"

Tasha replied, "There _is_ a lot that she could potentially teach us. Loki knows, we need it."

"It would not be wise to shirk her abilities or to anger her overly," Anastasia said. "While she could not get away with simply murdering us in our sleep, with Sleipnir on the watch, there are many things which she could do which would make life highly difficult and unpleasant for us that Sleipnir would have no way of readily stopping."

"Hey, are you going to ask _my_ opinion?" Sleipnir put in.

Jannika chuckled softly and said, "Yes, of course. What are your thoughts on the matter?"

"I think you should milk her for what you can," Sleipnir said. "She might not be the most pleasant person, definitely not people-oriented, but she knows her stuff, and she _has_ shown herself to be loyal to a contract. Just be nice to her, and be careful."

Tasha muttered under her breath, "I'd trust her more if I could get her to drink a bit of my blood a few times."

"I'm not sure if I fully agree on all her points," Jannika said. "But if nothing else, she definitely seems considerably more experienced than any of us in the wide open galaxy, even if she doesn't actually _look_ any older and wiser than us."

"As her genetic makeup differs in many ways from the baseline human, I don't believe that age and appearance are much of an accurate factor in determining her capabilities," Sleipnir pointed out.

"What do you know about her genetic makeup?" Tasha wondered wryly.

"Oh, well, I downloaded all the files from Tanaka Station before it blew. Moira was too busy trying to patch things together and keep me out of her systems to care much about Susan Tanaka's privacy."

"I thought she was an AI specialist and not a genetic engineer, anyway," Tasha said, although she remembered the woman's comments about dabbling into other fields of study.

"Well, yeah," Sleipnir said. " _She_ wasn't responsible for the creation of Melissa and Tharpie. The person who was, well, he was killed. By Melissa. Along with most of the others involved in Project Omega. The government would doubtless really love to get their hands on Melissa, but they've never been able to track her down and catch her. I can see why. The woman has more false identities than you'd believe."

"Wait, so we're carrying a fugitive from the law with us?" Tasha said.

"Oh, like you have room to talk," Sleipnir commented. "I think you have less to worry about _her_ getting caught than yourselves. She _did_ get you out of the trouble you got yourselves into with regards to the law, after all."

"Point," Tasha admitted with a smirk.

* * *

Jannika was lounging about the mess hall with Tasha and Anastasia, munching on a delicious ice cream cone with a scoop of rocky road and one of mint chocolate chip on a waffle cone, when Boston came up into the room. She waved to him a bit sheepishly and gave a crooked grin as she licked at her ice cream. He peered over oddly at her and went over to lean against the back of one of the chairs, then peered at Anastasia's plate of tacos, before scratching his head a bit.

"Where, exactly, are you keeping all this fresh food?" Boston wondered. "It's not in the cargo hold, and none of the other rooms seem to have any storage in them."

"Oh, um," Jannika said, almost dropping her ice cream. "It's all in a hidden compartment, of course. Wouldn't want anyone sneaking around and taking it after all."

Boston just looked at her and smirked, and said, "You're a bad liar, you know. Tell me where it's really coming from."

"That box on the wall," Jannika said, pointing. "Make whatever you want. Just as a note, it's not for sale." Boston went over to the replicator and poked at it a bit. "There's a voice activation, too. Just tell it what you want."

Boston raised an eyebrow, and said, "Steak and potatoes." Obediently, the replicator produced a plate of a large, juicy steak and some mashed potatoes with gravy. Boston picked up the plate and stared at it, sniffing at the food, before taking it over to the table and experimentally trying a bit. "It's steak and potatoes... It's real steak and potatoes. How did you _do_ this? And were you really planning on keeping this from me?"

"Well, yeah," Jannika said. "We figured if you knew about it, Pandora Corp would want their hands all over it, and frankly, we're not in any position to be trying to sell this thing. It's a replicator. Unfortunately, it's also black box technology. We have no idea how it really works yet."

"You seem to have a lot of that going on," Boston said dryly. "Like the fact that I couldn't help but notice you have artificial gravity on this ship, too. Where did you _get_ all of this?"

"Uh, yeah..." Jannika said. "It's kind of a long story."

"We're from the future," Tasha put in. "Sort of."

"What she said," Jannika said.

"Sort of?" Boston said.

"We originate from alternate universes, I and Natasha," Anastasia explained. "In her universe, it is presently the thirty-first century, whereas in mine, it is the twenty-third."

"Maybe I should just go back to sleep and write this all off as a bizarre dream or something," Boston muttered. "But this is such awfully tasty steak."

The mess hall doors slid open again, and Melissa strode through the doorway. She was carrying a plastic bottle full of a dark red liquid, which she brought over to Tasha cheerfully. Tasha raised an eyebrow and looked at it.

"A present for you, or a peace offering as the case might be," Melissa said. "Don't let it get cold, now."

Tasha tipped back the bottle into her mouth and began to drink. Jannika peered over at Melissa and said, "You brought her blood? Where did you get that?"

"Do you really want to ask?" Melissa said. "I'd have thought you might be a tad squeamish or something. A habit we're going to need to break you of; that simply won't do."

"Wait, Tharpie's still alive?" Jannika said.

"Was, anyway," Melissa said. "I'll be cleaning up in a moment. Just wanted to make sure the resident vampire was well-fed, though. Wouldn't want her to get hungry aboard a small spaceship, after all. Enjoy." She turned and headed out of the mess hall.

Boston was muttering, "Strange dream, bad dream, nightmare, hallucination, delusion..."

Jannika reached over and pinched him hard on the arm. "Wake up."

"Ack! What? What? Damn, not a dream." He smirked. "Okay, would somebody care to tell me what the _fuck_ that all was about?"

"Natasha is a vampire," Anastasia explained lightly. "I would have thought that much would have been not particularly difficult to glean."

"Right. A vampire. So obvious." Boston shook his head and blithely went back to munching on his steak and potatoes. "At least, I suppose, I couldn't complain about being bitten by pretty girls. I don't swing the other way."

Tasha paused for a moment and looked over at him, and said, "Does that mean you wouldn't mind making a little donation now and then?"

Boston snorted softly. "Why not, this day can't get any weirder. I go from almost getting killed to entering the fucking Twilight Zone. I'm trying to reason that you're some sort of genetically engineered cybernetic being that feeds on a diet of blood, rather than the alternative which is too weird to contemplate."

"I'll not break it to you anymore than we already have, then," Tasha said with a smirk, and went to finish off the bottle of blood.

"And, wait, did she just kill somebody down there for that blood?" Boston said.

"The crazy chick in the spandex who was trying to cause trouble," Jannika said.

"Oh, okay," Boston said. "The bitch who was trying to kill Hui."

"Yes, her."

Boston sighed. "I don't think I could go back to doing market surveys after all this. I don't suppose you lot would mind another hand here? I could always just put myself on 'extended off-world research' and go wherever... Not sure just how useful I might be able to be to you guys, but I can try."

"No more useless than the rest of us," Jannika said dryly. "So you're not going to tell Pandora Corp about our technology yet?"

Boston shook his head. "Wouldn't be right. It's proprietary technology still in development by a third party. While they _could_ take a look at it and try to reverse engineer it all, I doubt they'd have any better luck with it than our friend Sleipnir here will have."

"That's good," Jannika said. "We've had quite enough people trying to come after us or kidnap us for our technology." She snorted softly. "And Tanaka was just a small, independent researcher. I doubt we could handle it if Pandora Corp itself decided they wanted it."

"Heh," Boston said with a smirk. "Relax. So far as I know, Pandora doesn't make a habit of kidnapping people and stealing their technology. That sort of thing is bad for business, you know?"

"I'll take your word on that," Jannika said.


	25. Into the Frying Pan

And so, Sleipnir and his crew of five spent some time flying around from place to place and delivering replicated goods to where they were really needed. In the meantime, Melissa put the former cargo hold to good use with a gym mat on the floor and some other various equipment that could be brought in for training purposes. They fell into a routine, and Jannika quickly realized just why she should not eat so much junk food, as Melissa was determined to work it off her.

Tasha found herself in a particularly uncomfortable position as Melissa figured out the extent of her vampiric regenerative abilities, and thus wound up as the resident test dummy for various less-than-pleasant things that could be done to a person to make sure that they weren't going to be attempting to inconvenience you in the immediate future. Especially as Melissa was doing her best to make sure any of them got over any squeamishness they might still have about such things.

"I swear," Tasha muttered while Jannika, Anastasia, and Boston were eating lunch one day. "If she breaks my arm _one more time_ , I'm going to kill her."

Boston snickered softly and said, "I'm sure you're welcome to try. I don't imagine that you'd get very far, though."

"Probably not," Tasha said, sighing as she leaned back in her seat. "I kind of missed out on learning a lot of the things that a vampire can do. Might not be such a terrible idea to try to track them down once we can leave this universe after all. Or at least some vampire or another."

Boston held up a hand and said, "I'm still trying to get over the whole vampire thing here. Some part of my mind has still managed to convince itself that you're just some sort of genetically engineered human that happens to require blood to survive."

Tasha smirked. "Well, I'm not."

"Yeah, I _know_ this, intellectually, but it's still kind of out-there to my mind and some part of me hasn't really accepted it yet," Boston said. "Just bear with me. I'm sure with the whole alternate universe business, there's plenty of universes out there where there's also werewolves, or wizards, elves, fairies, dragons..."

"Actually..." Tasha said.

Boston put up a hand. "Don't tell me."

Tasha snickered softly. "No, really. And besides, you've got telepathic Squids from space around here. You're not really one to talk."

"I suppose you have a point," Boston said with a chuckle. "They seem perfectly normal when you've been around them your entire life, even if just so much as knowing they're there, but they must seem awfully strange to an outsider."

"They aren't much for money, though," Jannika put in. "I think they find our concept of credits to be very quaint and primitive, or something. But then they find a lot of things about humans to be quaint and primitive, so far as I know. I wonder what they find so fascinating in us."

"Well, it's all fine and good for them to have moved beyond the need for such things," Tasha said with a snort. "But we still need money."

"Oh?" Sleipnir put in. "How much? I think I've got a few mil I can loan you."

Jannika blinked and looked up at the ceiling. "Sleipnir? What are you talking about?"

"What? I've got plenty if you really need it for something," Sleipnir said. "You mean you weren't just flying around selling replicated goods for something to do that might be helpful and relatively charitable?"

"Where did you get that much money?" Jannika wondered.

"Oh, well, Moira wasn't needing it anymore," Sleipnir replied. "Susan Tanaka left everything in her will to go straight to Moira. So I kind of convinced Moira to leave everything to me."

"Convinced," Jannika repeated dubiously. "Right. And you didn't say anything about this?"

"You never asked," Sleipnir said lightly. "Of course I would have offered if you had some dire need or something. But you didn't really seem too hard up in general."

"I see," Jannika said flatly, smirking broadly. "So tell me. Did you actually 'convince' her, or did you just do some convenient hacking of the data files to get it to go to you after she was destroyed?"

"I just said I convinced her, didn't I?" Sleipnir said. "You know, she had twenty minutes to think about her impending demise without being able to actually do anything about it. That's an eternity for a computer. Sure, she was bitter about things at first, but in the end there were no hard feelings. And it was better me than it reverting to the government as it otherwise would have done. I don't think she liked the government overly much for some reason."

"So um, just how many credits did you wind up getting out of that, then?" Jannika wondered.

"Enough," Sleipnir said cheerfully. "But you don't need to know that. Suffice it to say, unless you really wanted to go on a major spending spree, you shouldn't have any trouble on the financial angle."

"Did you just not mention this so that Melissa didn't find out about it?" Jannika asked.

"Of course not," Sleipnir said. "It's not like Melissa is really in this for the money, anyway, despite appearances. If she were, well, she'd have never given the middle finger to the government in the first place. There's a hell of a lot better ways to make money in the galaxy than by attempting to train up a group of green adventurers."

"Then why is she really doing it?" Jannika wondered. "And why does she still demand money for it?"

"She has to maintain appearances, after all, and money is a reminder of how much you really need her. But no, I think she likes you lot and thinks you have potential, strange as it might sound. I think she's also fascinated in Tasha's vampirism, not to mention the entire business with the alternate universes. That's what I think she's really in it for. She knows we'll be leaving this universe eventually and wants to be on that train out. This is all, of course, speculation, mind you."

"Personally, Sleipnir, I'd trust your speculation more than most people's facts," Jannika commented.

"Aw," Sleipnir said. "I'm blushing."

* * *

Although they realized that money was no issue at that point, they kept up the runs a bit longer, and interspersed that with a charitable run to a remote colony that was in desparate need of supplies. They brought in a load of space rations and medical supplies, and didn't even bother to ask for a single credit for it all. Melissa scoffed a bit at their idea of charity, but didn't bother to complain too vehemently about it. Jannika just felt reassured that she was doing something good in the universe.

Along the way, they continued to monitor the progress of Pandora Corp's dimensional gate project. Sleipnir regularly posted stills on the construction's progress. Jannika grew both nervous and excited to see it at last nearing its final stages of completion. She knew perfectly well Tasha wouldn't want to stay in this universe, and she was quite eager herself for a chance to see what else might lie beyond the rim of possibility. There was a whole multiverse out there to see, and all the time they might want to do that in, and what better friends to share that all with?

At that thought, she finished pulling on her pajamas and glanced about her small quarters with a sigh. Sometimes space even seemed lonely when not too far away from others. She stepped out of her quarters and strode down the hallway to the double cabin on the end, and opened the door. She half expected to be walking into something more interesting than cuddling, but that's all Tasha and Anastasia were doing at the moment.

Tasha glanced up toward the door and said, "Jannika?"

"I, uh," Jannika said, stepping inside out of the doorway. "I hope you don't mind. It was lonely in my quarters."

Tasha smiled gently over at her. "Not at all. Come in, if you like. There's plenty of room here."

"Thanks."

Jannika went over to the bed to curl up next to Tasha, and quickly fell fast asleep, gently cradled in her arms. She could think of noplace else in the entire multiverse that she would rather be.

* * *

Finally, as the dimensional gate neared completion, they set a course back for planet Pandora. When they arrived in orbit, Sleipnir pulled up an image of the completed gate. Jannika stared uneasily at it. It was tall and rounded, with the warp coil set into the top and glowing blue tubes along the sides. But there was something about it that she just couldn't put her finger on, that made it seem like the stuff of nightmares and horror movies.

"So this is what we've been spending all these past months to build," Boston commented as he looked at the final images. "Impressive."

"Longer," Sleipnir said. "The early trials didn't really work too well, and it took them quite a bit of trial and error before they got a functional warp coil design out of it."

"Why have they been so intent on getting this project done, anyway?" Jannika wondered. "What do they hope to gain from it?"

"Oh, it's actually Pandora's pet project," Sleipnir said.

"What do you mean?" Jannika asked, raising an eyebrow. "I mean, I can see the corp's been working on it a lot, but..."

"No, no," Sleipnir said. "I mean Pandora the person."

"Wait, there's a person?" Jannika said.

"She's still alive?" Boston said, raising an eyebrow. "I thought that was just an urban legend."

"Oh, yes," Sleipnir said. "Pandora Smith is very much still alive, although she hasn't used that last name since she was, well, human you might say."

"I don't understand," Jannika said. "You mean the founder of Pandora Corp is still alive? But it's been around for centuries."

Boston said, "Urban legend has it that Pandora transfered her consciousness into a computer and essentially became an AI. But nobody's entirely certain just how such a thing might be done."

"It's not just a legend," Sleipnir said. "And yes, she did accomplish that, and has kept that secret under close wraps because she felt that humanity was not yet ready for immortality."

"Typical," Boston said with a smirk.

"She's been very adamant about getting this project done, although she hasn't elaborated on her reasons on just why to me anyway," Sleipnir said.

"Wait, wait," Jannika said. "You've been in contact with Pandora?"

"Look, Jannika," Sleipnir said. "If you try to hack into Pandora Corp's operations, of _course_ you're going to wind up in contact with Pandora. And you're only going to be seeing what she wants you to see anyway. If she's feeling particularly clever about it, she won't even bother to let you know that your routes of search have been misdirected, or that you only managed to see something 'top secret' because she wanted you to know about it. Most people, even corp employees, don't even know for certain that she even exists, and she prefers it that way."

"Does she know about us?" Tasha asked. "Does she know about me and Anastasia?"

"Oh, yes," Sleipnir said. "She hasn't felt the need to tell even her head scientists about it, though."

"Does she know about our technology?" Tasha asked worriedly.

"To an extent," Sleipnir said. "The way we've been travelling, it would be impossible to keep secret the fact that I have a far faster drive than anything else used in this universe. I've fudged our flight records, but I haven't gone to any particular trouble with it, merely enough to fool the cursory look most people are going to give it. Anyone that looks closer _will_ figure it out and wonder. She's hardly interested in trying to kidnap us and steal our technology, though. That's not the way she does business."

"That's a relief, I suppose," Jannika said. "When are they planning on activating the gate?"

"The first real test activation of the gateway is scheduled for oh-two-hundred tomorrow," Sleipnir said. "They still have as few people as possible knowing about the project in general, but there will still be over a hundred people present, from various tech staff to scientists to the engineers actually running the damned thing."

"And we're probably not invited, I'd imagine," Tasha said dryly.

"Not to worry," Sleipnir said. "We're going to watch anyway."

"From the safety of behind a viewscreen, I presume," Jannika said. "And in orbit. You know, just in case something goes terribly wrong like I have a bad feeling just might."

"Been listening to my horror stories of interdimensional invasions much, Jannika?" Tasha said, crooking a grin.

"Never hurts to be cautious," Jannika said.

Anastasia chuckled softly and said, "I did not believe that I would soon hear the day when you of all people would be advising prudence and caution. Perhaps there is hope for you yet."

Jannika smirked. "Yeah, well, don't get your hopes up too much. I'm sure it's just a temporary affliction."


	26. Virgins Need Not Apply

That evening, the entire motley crew turned up the mess hall to watch the event. It was like a party, complete with a variety of tasty food straight out of the replicator. Jannika didn't even care whatever sort of exercise program Melissa might decide to put them through tomorrow over it. She couldn't help but shake a niggling worry about the entire business, though. Just paranoia, really? After listening to Tasha's stories about how the Karzan Universe had been invaded multiple times by beings from other universes, she couldn't help but wonder if the same couldn't happen here.

"This is going to be great," Boston said around a mouthful of popcorn. "I've never gotten to see one of the corp's biggest projects tested before release before."

Anastasia munched on a bowl of tortilla chips and salsa. "Much as our time in this universe has been interesting, to say the least, it is definitely growing time to be moving on, preferably before we discover ourselves in further trouble with the government and other entities which may look to be doing unfavorable and unpleasant things toward us."

"Pandora knows we're here and watching, doesn't she," Tasha commented.

"Indeed she does," Sleipnir said. "She's most interested in the results herself and doesn't mind us watching."

"I'd just hate to be crashing someone's party and having to worry about someone coming up into orbit to shoot us down," Tasha said dryly.

"Shh, the show's starting," Jannika said, leaning forward to peer intently at the screen.

On the viewscreen in the mess hall, the feed from the portal showed it powering up slowly, flickering and pulsating light moving along the tubes running up its sides. Vibrant blue energy flows through the device, and the warp coil up on top began to radiate shimmering blue light. Slowly, the space within the gateway began to waver and twist upon itself, and the air was striated with dark and bright bands, moving about wildly like serpents. They spun and twirled about within the gate, until a swirling vortex appeared, black as oblivion and white as heaven.

The scientists around the portal babbled excitedly, taking measurements and examining readings. Then after a few moments, the surface of the vortax rippled. At first, the scientists wondered if it was destabilizing, but then something poked its way through. A horn, and then a beast, Jannika could only think that it looked like a shaggy gray unicorn. It snorted and nickered, and peered about the room. The scientists stared and exclaimed excitedly, and one of them tried to shoot a tranquilizer dart at it. The beast was struck in the rump, and it neighed in protest, then turned and bolted back through the vortex.

"Bloody fools," Tasha muttered. "Why did they go and do that?"

"I suppose they wanted to capture the creature and examine it more closely," Boston said, frowning. "I'm just not going to make any comments about what it looked like, either."

"They did not even attempt to communicate with the being first," Anastasia said. "Nor did they have any indication on whether or not it was actually sentient."

Down below, the viewscreen was showing the scientists insistantly poking forward a team of explorers that had been chosen to head through the portal and investigate what might be on the other side. They were more than a little nervous after the previous display, but they headed forward and through the swirling vortex nonetheless.

"Anyone taking bets on them being eaten by unicorns?" Jannika said.

Boston commented, "You know, this is the point where someone really should say something like 'You shouldn't joke about that.' But I don't think anyone that serious and boring is aboard this spaceship."

Even as the scientists continued taking readings excitedly, a few minutes later, the team came back through the portal at a run screaming, "Shut it down! Shut it down!"

"What's going on?" a scientist said. "What happened?"

"Shut it down! Now!" exclaimed the team leader. He turned and looked toward the gateway and uttered, "Oh fuck."

Through the swirling vortex, a herd of very angry-looking unicorns stampeded in. They proceeded to assail the crew working on the gateway, impaling them on their horns and kicking them with their hooves. The scene quickly turned into a bloody mess, leaving no one still alive to be able to shut down the gateway again. They did, however, manage to steal the entrance to the gate room from outside.

"Man, am I glad we're nowhere near there," Jannika murmured.

The unicorns were in a state of frenzied panic, and began to pound at the doors to get out. Jannika had to wonder why they didn't just head back through the portal, but figured that they must have seen humans on the other side of that doorway and wanted revenge. The things were a lot stronger than they looked, and despite whatever precautions Pandora Corp's scientists might have made, the creatures managed to use their horns to pry their way out and manipulate some of the mechanisms that were keeping the room locked down. Before long, the unicorns were running loose throughout the entire facility.

"So," Tasha said. "I wonder if anyone would mind if we went and retrieved that warp coil while they're busy with that."

"Risky," Jannika said. "The unicorns wouldn't know the difference between us and the people they were fighting."

"Wait, you're proposing stealing from Pandora Corp?" Boston said, appalled.

"Not at all," Tasha replied lightly. "Merely retrieving equipment from an obviously dangerous area."

"But it's built into the gateway."

Jannika said, "It shouldn't be too tough to remove intact, from the schematics I looked at. The trouble, of course, is getting in there and past those unicorns without being mauled or skewered."

"It could be done," Melissa put in.

"Wait, wait, wait," Boston said, holding up his hands. "Potentially stealing aside, you're not telling me you want to go _into_ a monster-infested facility here?"

"You're welcome to stay behind," Tasha said with a grin.

"This is insane, I tell you," Boston said. "Somebody has to be the voice of reason here."

"When does the voice of reason ever get listened to?" Jannika said. "I'm just surprised that it wasn't me who proposed this idea. Sleipnir, can you bring us down somewhere nearby that we could safely get into the facility from?"

"Will do," Sleipnir said. "And I'll presume that you want to be able to safely get out of the facility again afterwards."

"That would be a reasonable assumption to be making, yes," Jannika said dryly.

Melissa stood up and stretched a bit, and said, "Bring your weapons and equipment and get ready. We'll see just how well you've been paying attention in your training. Just whatever you do, if I tell you to do something, it would most likely be in your best interests to actually do it and not argue with me or something stupid like that. Understand?"

"Loud and clear," Tasha said. "You know your stuff better than we do. You're the boss."

"Good," Melissa said with a grin. "Meet me in the embarkation room when you're ready. We head out once we touch down." She headed off out of the bridge.

"Well, you heard her, guys, let's get moving," Tasha said.

They went off and collected their various weapons, the real ones they had stashed away and not the non-lethal training sorts that they had been working with for target practice. Killing someone or punching a hole in the side of the ship due to a training accident would not have been what they had had in mind with that. Melissa was already waiting for them, leaning casually next to the main hatch. Jannika had a blazer rifle in hand, a stun stick and a pistol at her belt, and Loki in her backpack.

"If they start paying undue attention to me," Sleipnir said, "I'll have to take off and wait in orbit. But I doubt they will, or that they'll even realize that I'm not just another building or piece of furniture. They seem to be mainly going after humans, and only attacking doors and the like if they've trapped them in. The unicorns seem like they just want to be _outside_ , and once they're outside they're not being particularly eager to get inside again."

"Good to know," Tasha said. "Are there still people inside?"

"Some survivors, I think. There's no one still in the gate room, but there might be some hiding out or trying to clean up the mess."

"Alright, time to go, people," Melissa said.

Melissa popped open the hatch and headed out toward the facility. It was a remote base on the far side of planet Pandora from their primary trade and production facilities, and from the outside it looked pretty unremarkable. There were doubtless thousands of such buildings scattered across the planet, with no one the wiser about just what might be going on inside. Jannika had to wonder precisely what other top secret projects Pandora Corp might be getting into at the moment, and whether any of _those_ would have galactic consequences as well. That would be a concern for another time, however, and very probably never for them at least.

The facility's doors had been ripped and smashed open, forced apart by desparate horns and hooves. In the distance, the sounds of hooves beating against cement could be heard, punctuated by the occasional scream and weapons fire. Melissa nodded to the group and headed toward the building's entrance. Some of the lights were still on inside, but others were flickering or out completely. The hallway was splattered with blood and gore, and most of the doors along the sides had been bashed open.

Further down the hallway, a unicorn burst out from a side corridor and came trampling toward them. It hardly even had a chance to get close before Melissa and Tasha's plasma fire took it down. Jannika almost had to feel guilty about the entire business. It wasn't the unicorns' fault that they were trapped here. But she had to take a realistic look at it, that the creatures were an immediate danger to them and others.

"The poor things," Anastasia murmured, echoing her thoughts.

"That poor thing was trying to kill you," Melissa pointed out quietly. "Remember that. Let's keep moving."

They headed down to the next floor below, trying to make their way to the gate room. The carnage was worse here, as more people were on this floor for the gate opening than on the main level. They heard the sounds of movement and breathing coming from one of the air vents, and saw that the cover had not been replaced very precisely.

"You can come out now," Tasha said. "They seem to be gone for the moment."

A man in a bloody lab coat poked his head hesitantly out of the ventilation duct. "Where did they go? Who are you?"

"We're here to help," Jannika said. "Did anyone manage to shut down the gateway?"

"N--No, I don't think so," the man said.

"We have to get in there and shut it down, before more of those things come through," Jannika said. "Think you can make it out of here alright, or would you rather go with us?"

"I'll stick with you," he said, eying their weaponry. "Someone needs to know how to shut it down. I'm Dr. Kleven, by the way."

"Nice to meet you. Let's go," Jannika said.

They hardly managed with brief introductions as they scrambled down the bloody corridors. Jannika would have never believed that unicorns could be so vicious if she hadn't seen the evidence of it for herself, but then, prior to this, she might not have believed they really existed in the first place. Down another flight of stairs, they came at last to the gate room, through heavily mangled open doors. The swirling vortex was still active, however at least nothing appeared to be coming through it at the moment.

"Can you shut it down?" Jannika asked.

"I just need to get to the control booth over there," Dr. Kleven said. "It'll take a while though, the systems might have been damaged in the attack."

"Melissa, I want you to protect Dr. Kleven as he gets that gate shut down," Tasha said. "Boston, you stay with them. Jannika and Nastya, I'd like you to come with me. We should see about securing the area and checking for survivors."

Melissa gave the slightest roll of her eyes and said, "Right, have fun."

The three of them headed off down the nearby corridor. Jannika felt a bit nervous about not having Melissa around, but admittedly there didn't seem to be anymore unicorns left on this floor at least. It was hard to believe that they might find any survivors through this mess of carnage, though. The sheer number of bloody and broken bodies almost made Jannika sick. She hadn't thought that there were this many people involved, and figured most of the ones involved on the gate project must now be dead.

As Tasha and Anastasia went over to give first aid to a wounded scientist, Jannika thought she heard a scraping noise coming from one of the side doors. It looked like it might be a storage closet of some sort, and she thought it must be a survivor who had locked themselves up inside but now was having trouble getting out again. She headed over and opened the door. To her surprise, the closet was occupied by a small gray unicorn, one of its hind legs bent at a horrible angle. The creature looked up at her with fearful, pleading brown eyes.

"You poor thing," Jannika murmured softly. "What happened to you?"

Jannika reached out a hand to touch it softly, but the unicorn whimpered pathetically and shied away from her. The leg looked like it might be broken, but it was hard to tell from here given the poor lighting.

"There now, it's alright," Jannika said soothingly. "I won't hurt you. I promise. Just let me take a look at that leg, okay?"

The creature relaxed a little under her quiet words, and she was able to get in closer and examine it. From the looks of things, it wasn't hurt beyond some cuts and scrapes, and the leg wasn't actually broken, just jammed in against a piece of some sort of technical equipment. With Jannika's help, the unicorn was able to extricate itself from the closet. She dug around in her backpack for some first aid supplies to dab at its cuts and make sure that it wasn't bleeding or going to get infected.

"There now, all better?" Jannika said. "You want something to eat? I think I've got something in here for you."

She pulled out a chocolate bar from her pack. Always one to be carrying some sort of junk food around, at least it wasn't space rations or the like. She'd given herself the excuse that it was quick energy, but she knew perfectly well that that was bullshit and she'd only taken it because it was tasty. She unwrapped it and offered a bit of it to the unicorn. Eagerly, the beast munched up the chocolate out of her fingers, then nosed about for the rest of it, sniffing at the wrapper intently.

Jannika laughed softly. "Alright, alright, here you go."

She pulled off the wrapper carefully and fed the remainder of it to the creature. Once it was done eating, the unicorn nuzzled against her affectionately, whickering at her fondly. She patted it gently on the neck, chuckling and shaking her head a bit. What was she ever going to do with a unicorn? Besides try to send it home, anyway.

Jannika tapped her wrist comm and said, "Jannika to all units. Please don't hurt my new friend."

"I'm not even going to ask what you're doing," Melissa's reply came over the comm.

The unicorn spooked a little at the voice and gave Jannika's wrist an odd look. "It's a talking device," Jannika explained, showing the wrist device to it. "See? It won't hurt you."

After staring at the thing for a few moments more, the unicorn seemed to decide that the wrist-comm was not a threat of any sort, and relaxed again.

"Hmm," Jannika said. "You don't look as big as the other unicorns, so I guess you're not fully grown yet. And if your anatomy is anything like a horse's anatomy, I'm guessing that you'd be a girl unicorn. Come on, let's go meet my friends. I'm sure you'll like them, but they probably don't have any chocolate to give you."

"Your new friend, I presume?" Tasha said in amusement as she approached.

The unicorn shied away from them at first, but then quickly realized that these humans weren't shooting at her or attempting to hurt her. Once that got through her head, she approached Tasha and Anastasia curiously, sniffing about at them and examining them from all angles. She spent a few more minutes sniffing at Tasha, and made an odd expression and snorted a bit, then backed away and cocked her head at Tasha, looking at her in puzzlement.

"I don't think it likes me," Tasha said dryly.

"Tasha's a vampire, little one," Jannika said to the unicorn. "Don't worry. She won't bite. She sticks to humans."

"We'd best head back to the gate room," Tasha said. "And see about getting that warp coil. If the gate's not shut down yet, we might still be able to send this one home again."

They went back to the portal room, the young unicorn diligently following Jannika all the way. When they arrived back in the room, Melissa promptly pointed a gun at the creature, and raised an eyebrow. The unicorn shied away and tried to hide behind Jannika and her friends.

"What did you do, bring home a pet?" Melissa scoffed. "I take my eyes off you girls for five minutes and you start bringing home cute furry creatures."

"Can we keep her?" Jannika said lightly.

Dr. Kleven looked up and over at them and said, "Oh dear, oh dear. We should send it back while we still can. Take it over to the portal, quickly now, girls!"

"Come on," Jannika said gently to the unicorn. "You want to go home, don't you? Where it's nice and safe and scary two-legged people aren't pointing guns at you?"

The creature ignored Jannika and strode over toward the control booth where Dr. Kleven had been working. She gestured with her horn as if to direct him to move away from the console. Confused, he stepped back, quite nervous about being close to the creature. Sniffing and poking at the controls for a moment, the unicorn then bit down on a lever and pulled it back, and kicked at another console, causing sparks to fly as it lost power. In the main gate room, the glowing pipes around the gateway went dark, and the swirling vortex shimmered out of existence.

Jannika blinked, and looked in confusion at Dr. Kleven. "Wait a minute, you were actually trying to shut the gate down, weren't you?"

"Of course I was!" Dr. Kleven shouted. "And get this monster away from me!"

The unicorn turned to him, glaring at him threateningly and lowering her horn to point straight as his chest. Terrified, he backed up against a wall, but couldn't go any further. Jannika and Tasha stepped up on either side of the unicorn, looking at him intently.

"You weren't actually trying to do that at all, were you?" Tasha said. "What _were_ you trying to do?"

"Please don't hurt me! Get this thing away from me! You don't know what you're doing! I can't let the gate project be sabotaged! It took months of work just to get it to start up. I'd never be able to start it up a second time. I was trying to recalibrate it to open a portal to a different world instead."

"Why?" Jannika said. "What would you possibly hope to accomplish at this point? Starting _another_ alien invasion of _different_ critters? And what in the galaxy were your compatriots thinking trying to tranq that unicorn that came in first?"

"To keep any more of the monsters from coming in, of course!" Dr. Kleven said frantically. "Please get this thing off of me! Spare me! Have mercy! I'll do anything!"

"Right," Jannika said with a smirk. "How about you tell us how to safely extricate the warp coil and let us walk away with it without alerting your superiors?"

His eyes widened. "That's why you came here? You're just thieves looking to steal our technology? What would _you_ do with it?"

"We're not _thieves_ ," Tasha said. "And _we_ know how to use it safely. We just want to get home again, that's all."

"Dr. Kleven, you do not understand our situation here," Anastasia said to him. "I and Natasha here came to this universe from another dimension on the event of your first warp coil experiment, and we have been attempting to find a way back ever since. If we are feeling particularly generous upon your cooperation, we may decide to share our interdimensional drive technology with your corporation before we leave."

"I don't have the authority to authorize such a thing!" Dr. Kleven said. "But go ahead, take it! I can't stop you! It just... unscrews!"

Jannika smirked at him and headed over toward the gate to check it out. There was a service ladder heading up the side allowing relatively easy access to the warp coil up top. She pulled out her tools and proceeded to work on 'unscrewing' it as Dr. Kleven had said. Sure enough, it came out easily enough, and she extracted the warp coil and climbed down with it in her hands. It was a surprisingly light and small object for how much work they'd put into being able to get their hands on it. Just a little spiral that could change the universe forever.

When she returned to the booth, Dr. Kleven was still panicking and being held at horn point by the unicorn. "You've got what you came for. Are you going to let me go now?"

"I think I'll leave that up to my new friend to decide," Jannika said. "What do you say, girl? Should we let him go?"

The unicorn nickered, then in reply, impaled the scientist on her horn, neatly piercing his heart clean through. She pulled her horn loose and let the surprised-looking body slide to the floor. Jannika smirked broadly and pulled out a cloth to wipe the blood off the creature's horn.

"Good enough answer," Jannika said.

"I like your new friend," Melissa said wryly.

Jannika chuckled softly and patted the unicorn on the neck. "I guess you're not going home after all. Come on, let's get out of here, before the planetary guard or something shows up."

They made their way back out of the facility and back to where Sleipnir was parked, the unicorn obediently following after them and occasionally kicking at one of the corpses along the way. The area outside the facility was quiet at the moment, in the dead of night, although in the distance the sounds of ships approaching could be heard. They got back to the ship quickly and Jannika opened up the cargo hold, ushering the unicorn inside along with the rest of them. Sleipnir took off once they were all inside and the cargo bay doors closed.

"I'm afraid you'll have to stay in the cargo hold," Jannika said. "I don't think those hooves would be good for negotiating the ladder. We'll be sure to bring you food and anything you might need."

"Like a bucket," Tasha pointed out.

"Right," Jannika said. "So, hmm. What are we going to call you, girl?"

The unicorn whickered something that sounded like, "Hahihihi."

"What was that?" Jannika said.

"Hahihihi," repeated the unicorn.

"I believe that was meant to be her name," Anastasia said.

"Hahihihi," Jannika said slowly. "Right. Uh, mind if we call you Giggles?"

The unicorn whickered in amusement. "I don't think she minds," Anastasia said with a smirk.

"Excuse me," Sleipnir said. "But do you guys want to set a course for another system, or shall we just continue to hang around in orbit until they start suspecting us of foul play?"

"Go ahead," Jannika said. "Once I make some arrangements for Giggles here so that she's comfortable, I'll see about installing this warp coil. The ship _was_ designed so that it could be just plugged in, right?"

"Correct," Sleipnir said. "Although I'm not sure it's going to be quite as helpful as you'd hoped."

"What do you mean?" Jannika wondered, raising an eyebrow.

"I mean that if you intend to leave the universe, we would require a destination," Sleipnir explained. "I do not have any coordinates for the universes Tasha and Anastasia have been speaking of in order to travel to any of them."

"Now you tell me," Jannika muttered, shaking her head. "We'll figure something out. First things first." She patted Giggles on the back. "I'll be back shortly with some things for you, okay?"

The unicorn whickered at her, and with a grin, Jannika headed out along with the rest of the crew. The others scattered off to their quarters, the mess hall, and the rec room, while Jannika went up to the engine room to secure the warp coil first before heading to the mess hall to get some things replicated. A bucket, some blankets, a bit of food... She could only hope that with the intelligence displayed so far, that Giggles would be able to understand relieving herself in a bucket rather than on the floor. She hadn't really intended their ship to become a stable or anything. She could also only hope that the creature's diet wasn't anything too strange or that it wasn't allergic to one thing or another that she might inadvertently feed her.

Giggles seemed happy enough with the arrangements, however, and nuzzled Jannika in the shoulder affectionately when she brought in and set up the items for her. Jannika chuckled softly and sat down across from her, looking over the unicorn thoughtfully.

"I wish I could really talk to you," Jannika said. "There's so much I'd love to ask you. Like why did you come through the portal, and how did you wind up in that closet? Were you just following the rest of your herd so that you didn't get left behind, or did you have reasons of your own for coming? Maybe you were as curious as I am about seeing other universes, going places you've never been before..."

Giggles whinneyed, and bobbed her head. Jannika raised an eyebrow and peered at her thoughtfully, wondering if she was trying to say something. Oh, for a universal translator or something. Aliens inexplicably speaking English was rarely a problem in science fiction!

"Was that a yea or a neigh?" Jannika said with a smirk. "So, _can_ you actually understand what I'm saying to you, then?"

Giggles shook her head up and down again, almost as if in a nod, and whickered at her.

"I'm going to take that as a yes," Jannika said pensively. "Interesting. Hmm, you know, come to think... Sleipnir, you say you don't have the coordinates for the place Tasha mentioned she wanted to go. Do you have the ones for the universe Pandora Corp opened that portal to? The one where the unicorns were from?"

The unicorn snorted and neighed, shaking her head from side to side and stamping her front hoof. Jannika looked toward her in puzzlement and raised an eyebrow.

"What, you don't want to go back there, even to see if the warp coil works?" Jannika wondered. "I'm not exactly planning on shoving you off if you don't want to go, after all."

Giggles seemed a little mollified, but still snorted softly. Sleipnir said, "Yes, I do have the coordinates for that particular universe if you really want to go there."

"Sleipnir, is there any way you can translate what Giggles is trying to say to me?" Jannika said. "I mean, the body language is coming across clearly enough, but it makes it a bit one-sided and I imagine it must be rather difficult for her to try to convey any more complex concepts and statements."

"What do I look like, the Starship Enterprise?" Sleipnir said dryly. "But no, seriously, I could, but it would take a while to build a basic vocabulary. She also clearly has some minor psychic power to be able to understand us and communicate as much as she's managed."

"I suppose that might be why she turned on Dr. Kleven but knew the rest of us really meant her no harm," Jannika murmured thoughtfully.

Giggles nodded her head and whickered. Sleipnir said, "But anyway, yes, I could try to start building a database by showing her images and having her state what they are in her language. It would take time, of course, but eventually I might be able to make a decent translation device possible."

"Alright," Jannika said, and looked to Giggles. "Would you be willing to do that?" Giggles nodded enthusiastically. "Okay. You can get started on that whenever you like. I'm going to go get some lunch and some sleep. Give a whinny if you need anything."


	27. A Place You've Never Been

Jannika woke up and went out of her quarters and climbed up the ladder to the top deck. She passed Boston in the rec room watching a silly comedy movie, and wearily stepped into the mess hall, yawning. Anastasia was there, munching on a burrito, along with Tasha.

"How do you eat so much Mexican food and not get fat?" Jannika wondered, heading over to the replicator to make herself some waffles.

"Magic," Anastasia replied lightly, smirking at her.

"Good morning, Jannika!" Sleipnir said cheerfully. "Your dietary information recommends a glass of orange juice with your breakfast this morning. You aren't getting enough vitamin C. It would be positively embarrassing for you to get scurvy."

"Stow it, Sleipnir," Jannika said. "And didn't I have something with tomato sauce in it yesterday?"

"Negative," Sleipnir said. "In fact, you've been eating nothing but chips and candy bars for the last couple days. Very unhealthy. Tsk, tsk. I think you're just taking overly advantage of the fact that Melissa can't use the cargo hold as a gym what with you having turned it into a stable."

"She had me doing push-ups in my quarters anyway," Jannika said, and sighed. "And fine, I suppose I'll have to start watching that better. Give me the damned orange juice, then."

The replicator fizzled her order into existence, and she took the food over to the table to start eating. Sleipnir said, "Not to worry, that's what I'm here for, after all. In fact, I've helpfully compiled a list of dietary recommendations in line with your usual preferences that would be much more capable of meeting your physical needs as well as keeping you healthy enough to play vampiric blood donor. Would you like to see?"

"Yeah, yeah, sure," Jannika said. Sleipnir brought up some lists on a datapad, and she glanced over them while eating. "Wait a minute," she said, swallowing a mouthful of waffle. "You want me to eat _more_ pizza and spaghetti?"

"Oh, yes," Sleipnir said. "Pasta is high in carbohydrates, and with the right toppings or sauce, such selections can quite readily meet your dietary requirements."

"Works for me," Jannika said. "So long as you're not talking liver and onions as the 'right toppings'."

"No, no, nothing like that," Sleipnir said. "Some pineapple, pepperoni or sausage for the protein, perhaps some peppers or other vegetables, mushrooms are good too..."

"So in other words, you want me to stop eating so much junk and actually eat something resembling real food."

"Pretty much," Sleipnir said. "If you insist on supplementing your diet with candy bars, crackers, and chips, I have some recommendations for those as well. Some nuts and fruit filling would help more than just plain chocolate, for instance, and might I recommend some nice salsa or dip along with corn tortilla chips like Anastasia is consuming?"

"I like your dietary plan," Jannika said with a smirk.

"I'm glad you approve. After all, dietary recommendations are somewhat useless if they recommend things you aren't actually going to eat anyway."

Tasha grinned across at her and said, "I think he's got you pinned, Jannika."

Sleipnir added, "By the way, we'll be coming out of hyperspace in two hours. The system is uninhabited so we shouldn't have anyone bothering us in the interim. I'll be shutting down the engines and going to maneuvering thrusters only so that you can get to work on installing that warp coil."

"Alright," Jannika said.

"Pandora is somewhat cross with us over the whole business, but they'll have trouble sending anyone out that could hope to keep up with us at the moment," Sleipnir said. "After angering the most powerful corporation in the galaxy, might I suggest that we would want to be somewhere else in the near future?"

Tasha smirked broadly. "That was sort of the plan. Though once we can figure out how to get there, anyway."

They arrived in the system on schedule. It was a red dwarf system, with one small, forlorn planet, and no signs of life anywhere. Sleipnir set into orbit around the star and slowly powered down the engines. Even if something went terribly wrong and even the thrusters failed, from here it would take quite a while for them to fall into serious danger, giving plenty of time to fix the problem if it could be fixed.

Jannika headed back to the engine room and pulled out the warp coil from the box she had stowed it in. It was dark without the power flowing into it from outside, but there was still a faint bit of shimmer inside of it from whatever was used to fill it. She was insatiably curious about how the device really worked, but she could relax, and tell herself that once they were safely out of this universe, she could have all the time in the world to play with this technology and learn and make advancements of it of her own.

Here goes nothing, Jannika thought as she opened up the engine casing and began fitting the warp coil in place. It wasn't so much that it had been designed with this particular warp coil in mind, but that it had been made to be adjustable and able to work itself around a variety of components. Perhaps not quite so simple as just plugging it in, but it wasn't much more than that at the moment.

She finished up and closed up the case, brushing herself off and putting away her tools. "Alright, that's that," she said. "Sleipnir, want to run some tests on it and make sure it's installed properly, and wasn't damaged on the way in or anything?"

"Will do," Sleipnir said. "Where to once that's done?"

"Until we can figure out how to get to this place Tasha wanted to go, let's take advantage of our new speed and zip off to somewhere well away from established space, just to make damned sure nobody's going to be tracking us down anytime soon while we get all that figured out."

"Righto," Sleipnir said.

Jannika headed out of the engine room and out the door into the rec room. Everyone was in there, and Melissa had turned it into an impromptu gym, with the others on the floor doing situps. There was no escaping down the ladder before Melissa spotted her and waved her over.

"Good, you're just in time. Get over here and get down and give me fifty."

Jannika reluctantly went over to comply, and said lightly, "You know, I think you're just trying to kill us slowly and painfully."

"Hey, it's my job, right?" Melissa said with a grin.

* * *

"So where are going?" Boston wondered, glancing about at the others gathered on the bridge for an answer.

"A place we've never been," Jannika said, grinning as she poked at the console.

"Sounds fun," Boston said dryly. "You know, I'm still miffed at you guys over the whole stealing from Pandora Corp thing."

"Don't worry about it," Sleipnir put in. "Pandora was quite mollified when I sent her the schematics for the engines."

"You sent her that?" Jannika said, raising an eyebrow.

"Not, mind you, that it won't take them years to get a working model, anyway," Sleipnir said. "If for no reason other than they'll have to deal with the fact that according to their own laws, they'll be required to use an AI like me in every ship they make with the plans, and that's assuming they can get their hands on many actual luminite crystals and not just wiring. Oh, and I also offered to note this universe down in my database as the Pandora Universe."

"I'm sure _that_ made her happy," Jannika said dryly. "So, what, you're planning on telling everyone in every other universe we come across that we're from the Pandora Universe?"

"Hey, everyplace needs a name, doesn't it?" Sleipnir said. "And it's as good a name as any."

"I suppose," Jannika said.

"Oh, by the way, she sent a message for you, too, Boston," Sleipnir added. "She offered you a promotion. She said you could be Pandora Corp's official extradimensional representative."

"Really?" Boston said, quickly brightening.

"Uh-huh."

"So, are we ready to go?" Jannika said eagerly.

"Just about," Sleipnir said. "I could explain to you guys my methods for analyzing other dimensions and determining how to get there, but I'll spare you the technobabble about hyperspace resonance signatures and just power up and set a course, kay?"

"Probably for the best," Tasha said with a smirk.

"And hey, it just might be where we meant to go!" Sleipnir added.

"I have faith in you," Jannika said dryly.

The engines powered up to full, and the warp coil activated, filling the viewscreen with the swirling vortex of light and darkness of hyperspace, and forever leaving behind the Pandora Universe.


End file.
